The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) will this year launch a transit scheme for trucks moving along the Abidjan-Lagos corridor to deposit a guarantee bond to enable them to cross over to other countries.
The initiative, according to the Secretary-General of the AfCFTA Secretariat, Wamkele Mene, is to reduce costs to the private sector.
He said even when the trucks moved from the ECOWAS region to another region, they would be subject to only one cost for transit guarantee.
Mene announced this last Saturday in an address on the final day of the Africa Prosperity Dialogues (APD) 2025.
Background
The three-day conference started last Thursday and was climaxed with a presidential gala dinner and awards last Saturday.
It witnessed the convergence of over 3,000 delegates from 46 countries who discussed and generated valuable insights and momentum to accelerate progress towards a shared vision for a prosperous and integrated African continent.
At the centre of this year’s discussions and thematic meetings was how to deliver infrastructure for the continent to push integrated and inter-continental trading activities under the AfCFTA initiative.
The dialogue was on the theme “Delivering Africa’s single market through infrastructure: Invest, Connect, Integrate.”
Deliberating on the theme, Mene said it challenged stakeholders to consider the progress made by the continent since the establishment of the then Organisation of African Unity (OAU) in 1963.
AfCFTA achievements
One of these principles was to establish a single payment system for the continent.
Decades later, Mene said there was also the AfCTFA, even though he admitted it had come late.
“Today, as we speak, along with the Afreximbank, we have the Pan-African Payment and Settlement System (PAPSS) which made payment in local currency,” he stated.
Mene expressed excitement about the support the Heads of State and Government had given to the establishment of PAPSS, which he indicated was a tool to boost intra-African trade and reduce the cost of trading within Africa.
The AfCFTA Secretary-General further stated that the establishment of the AfCFTA Adjustment Fund was also in response to the challenges of the founding mothers and fathers in 1963 for the continent to overcome the industrial and economic differentials and mobilise resources to ensure that there were quality benefits on trade on the continent.
“Today, we have established the AfCFTA Adjustment Fund; we have mobilised $1 billion, and we want to mobilise up to $10 billion or even more, again to respond to this very specific challenge of economic differentials in Africa and the quality of benefits from trade,” the AfCFTA Secretary-General added.
Mene said Africa’s private and public sectors must benefit from the fund and invest in the industrial development and also in the manufacturing capabilities on the continent.
Artificial borders
On artificial borders, Mene stated that traversing the continent’s borders was still a challenge and, therefore, called for the development of roads to ensure that when Africans traversed those artificial borders, the cost to their businesses did not increase with every border they crossed.
He said PAPSS would ensure that the continent had digital and financial inclusion, as well as the inclusion of small medium enterprises (SMEs) that were operated by women and young people, so that all Africans would benefit from Africa’s digital economy, which was projected by the International Finance Corporation (IFC) to reach $720 billion by the year 2035.
He expressed optimism that in 20 to 30 years, the African continent would be the most globally competitive and most dynamic region in the world.
