Africa-wide free trade deal to initially benefit bigger countries
Countries with industrial and export capacity will be the immediate beneficiaries, says AfCFTA head Wamkele Mene
The key implementer of Africa’s free trade agreement, which seeks to establish a single market for goods and services on the continent, says the pact will initially benefit mostly relatively wealthy nations with a strong industrial base such as SA and Nigeria.
Wamkele Mene, who heads the AfCFTA’s Ghana-based secretariat, said in an interview this week that in a bid to cushion the smaller countries that may suffer short-term losses as a result of the reduction or the elimination of tariffs, the AfCFTA, together with the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank), a multilateral trade finance institution, recently established an adjustment fund with a seed amount of $1.2bn...
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