The President of the Board of Directors, African Export-Import Bank , Professor Benedict Oramah has revealed that the 16 percent of total intra-African trade witnessed now can only appreciate if attention is moved away from commodities to manufacturing.
“To bring prosperity to Africa we have to move away from commodities; we have to unlock manufacturing. This will, however, require that we bring down the borders and most importantly that we reverse engineer the colonial strategy. “The AfCFTA has now come into force. It is expected that it will by 2022 bring the share of intra-African trade to 22 percent, up from current levels of about 16 percent and bring total intra-African trade to about 250 billion US dollars, from about 160 billion US dollars currently.
“It is clear from the foregoing that the 84.000 km of borders that Africa suffers today did not arise by chance; any wonder why despite almost 60 years of independence, Africa remains the continent with the lowest manufacturing output despite an abundance of resources, It is also little wonder why Africa is the continent that trades the least with itself, despite the strong relationship between intra-regional trade and industrial development and economic progress.