All is set for commercially meaningful trading in goods under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement to commence.
AfCFTA Secretary-General Wamkele Mene disclosed this in Accra at a meeting with media owners, CEOs, managers and senior editors, and added that the e-tariff book and the rules of origin manual are already on the AfCFTA website to be used by the continent to trade under the continental trading agreement.
“We have now been able to negotiate almost 90 percent, in fact I think its 88.8 percent convergence on rules of origin. So over these 5000 products that we trade in Africa, we now have agreement close to 90 percent.
He explained that the AfCFTA Secretariat will be leading a guided trade among some countries which have demonstrated their readiness to trade under the AfCFTA.
Mr. Mene explained that with about 40 different currencies in circulation on the continent, so far about 35 banks have signed on to the Pan-African Payment and Settlement System (PAPSS) which is a cross-border financial infrastructure, enabling payment transactions across Africa.
He announced that AfCFTA has secured US$9billion made up of US$7billion from Equity Bank and US$2billion from World Food Programme (WFP) and African Export–Import Bank (Afreximbank) to support areas such as value addition, agriculture (food production), minerals, among others.
The AfCFTA Boss added that the money will be disbursed to Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) which are the pillars for implementation to boost private sector productivity.
The AfCFTA Secretary-General announced plans to raise US$10billion adjustment fund to help member-countries develop industrial capacity. Out of this amount, he said AfCFTA has raised US$1billion from the Afreximbank, explaining that private companies that desire to access the fund will have to apply through their respective governments.
“There are countries that simply don’t have any export capacity, so the big question is: How do we help those countries? That’s why we went to Afreximbank and we said we want to raise up to US$10billion for an AfCFTA Adjustment Fund, and we’ve raised about US$1billion so far.”
Mr. Mene acknowledged that the continent is faced with infrastructure challenges, particularly road infrastructure bottlenecks, which require urgent attention.
