The African Development Bank Group will help African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) for building a strong secretariat by extending an institutional grant of US$4.8-million. The grant was approved some time back in April this year, before the formal agreement for creating AfCATA was signed. The free trade zone will help the region to boost the combined GDP to the level of US$ 2.5 trillion. The secretariat will function both as a think tank and a catalyst for achieving the objectives of the free trade in the given time frame.
The agreement was signed by Albert Muchanga, AU’s Commissioner for Trade and Industry, for the continental body, and Andoh O. Mensah, representing the Bank’s Director of the Industrial and Trade Development Department (PITD) for the Bank, signaling the startup of implementation. The AU has set up an interim secretariat, which is providing the organizational structure for the permanent administrative body. The permanent secretariat of AfCATA will be set up in Accra, Ghana and all 55 countries in the region will come on board as equal partners in the agreement. While the target of intra-trade of the region is pegged at US$ 2.5 trillion by 2030 or so, the agreement envisions a yearly addition of US$ 35 billion to the intra-trade. The intra-trade is currently estimated at 16% of the total trade volume, which is way behind that of EU and ASEAN. The largest trading block in making-AfCATA- will facilitate free movement of goods, services and people among the African region. Also, it would help in curbing illegal trade through porous borders in the region leading to great loses to the governments.
