Despite an abundance of trade liberalization schemes and reforms to open African mar-kets, intracommunity and inter-Africa trade remains low and undiversified. Despite growing by 7.6% during 1994–2000, overall intracommunity trade averaged only 10.5%
of total exports and 10.1% of imports. Inter-Africa trade between regional economic community members and nonmembers fared even more poorly—averaging 7.6% of total exports and 9.0% of imports (figures 5.1 and 5.2). For Africa to attain intra-community and inter-Africa trade levels comparable to similar trade in other regions, it has to more than double current rates of growth of its internal trade. Thus the con-tinent must deepen and harmonize trade liberalization programmes and address the considerable supply-side constraints. The total picture, however, conceals considerable variations in performance among the regional economic communities.
Table 5.4 shows the shares of Africa’s regional economic communities in intracommu-nity trade, based on the absolute values of exports and imports in 1994–2000.6SADC accounts for the largest shares of exports (31%) and imports (30%), partly reflecting South Africa’s large economy. Other strong export-oriented economies within SADC, such as Mauritius and Zimbabwe, also contributed. Countries such as Malawi and Mozambique were equally impressive in direct exports to the SADC market. SADC tops the other economic communities despite the fact that it began implementing a trade protocol only in September 2000. As implementation of the protocol gathers momentum, intra-SADC trade will likely increase further.
Overall intracommunity trade averaged only 10.5% of total exports and 10.1% of imports
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Box 5.1
Trade facilitation and promotion in COMESA: A model for other regional economic communities
Facilitating and promoting trade requires not only removing tariffs and nontariff barriers, but also simplifying trade and lowering the cost of doing business. Such efforts also promote competi-tiveness in regional and global markets because they shorten delivery times and cut costs, low-ering the price of goods. Unique among African economic communities, COMESA has implemented many measures to facilitate and promote trade:
• Harmonized road transit charges in 1991: implemented in at least 10 countries.
• Harmonized axle load limits: operational in 16 countries.
• Carrier license and transit plates: implemented in nine countries by 1998.
• Road transit custom declaration document: in operation since 1986.
• Advance Cargo Information System: a computerized system that tracks the movement of cargo and transport equipment through ports, railways, roads, and lakes.
• Yellow Card vehicle insurance scheme covering third-party liability and medical expenses:
operational in 12 countries.
• Customs bond guarantee scheme: meant to eliminate avoidable administrative and financial costs associated with national customs bond guarantees for transit traffic.
• Automated System for Customs Data and Management, a computerized customs data sys-tem that records manifests, customs declarations, customs accounting procedures, exam-ination controls, warehousing, import and export licenses and permits, and foreign trade processing procedures: enables faster clearance of goods by customs and generation of accurate, reliable, and timely trade and customs revenue and statistics. EUROTRACE uses foreign trade statistics generated by the system for efficient and effective collection, compi-lation, and analysis of foreign trade statistics.
• Uniform classification of goods for customs purposes.
• Common statistical rules and regulations: for systematic, comprehensive collection, compi-lation, analysis, and production of foreign trade statistics.
• Simplification and harmonization of trade documents and procedures: the COMESA cus-toms declaration document is to be used for clearance of exports, imports, transit, and ware-housing, replacing all declaration forms being used by member states.
• Common competition rules and harmonization of technical norms and certification procedures.
• Trade information services: facilitate trade through computerized databases, trade directo-ries, trade inquidirecto-ries, and monthly bulletins.
• Trade support services: to strengthen business organizations such as the Eastern and Southern African Business Organization, chambers of commerce, and other trade promo-tion and business entities by providing advisory services, organizing trade fairs and semi-nars, and assisting the private sector to enter into subcontract business.
Source: COMESA Secretariat 2001.
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ECOWAS ranks second on both exports (almost 20% of the intracommunity total) and imports (21%). The community has made good progress on trade liberalization for unprocessed goods and traditional handicrafts, with all members except Liberia elim-inating all tariffs. Less progress has been made on industrial goods, where the tariff reduction schedule has faced problems. Considering that ECOWAS was established
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14
2000 1999
1998 1997
1996 1995
1994
Inter-Africa exports Intracommunity exports
Source: Economic Commission for Africa, compiled from IMF 2001.
Figure 5.1
Intracommunity and inter-Africa exports as a share of Africa’s total exports, 1994–2000 (%)
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14
2000 1999
1998 1997
1996 1995
1994
Inter-Africa imports Intracommunity imports
Source: Economic Commission for Africa, compiled from IMF 2001.
Figure 5.2
Intracommunity and inter-Africa imports as a share of Africa’s total imports, 1994–2000 (%)
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nearly three decades ago, its performance ought to be better. Higher trade levels should be possible if ECOWAS makes substantial progress on trade liberalization for indus-trial goods—and if complete harmony can be achieved between UEMOA and ECOWAS to secure a more unified West African subregional market.
CEN-SAD’s share of internal trade ranks third (about 13% of both exports and imports). Of fairly recent creation, with members straddling several regional economic communities, CEN-SAD has yet to develop full-fledged trade. CEN-SAD’s imports are concentrated among its UMA members. Libya is the largest UMA exporter to CEN-SAD, followed by Tunisia and Morocco. Non-UMA countries such as Egypt and Nigeria are also important exporters. CEN-SAD appears to offer a broadened mar-ket space that most UMA countries can take advantage of and will likely provide a vital trade bridge between the North African subregion (made up primarily of UMA coun-tries) and Sub-Saharan Africa.
COMESA ranks fourth in internal trade (about 9.5% of both exports and imports).
The expansion and deepening of its free trade area now under way is expected to gen-erate substantial trade in the subregion. Kenya accounts for almost half of intra-COMESA exports (49%), followed by Zimbabwe (20%). Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt, Malawi, and Uganda are major destinations of intra-COMESA imports. (See table A5 for more details on country rankings in intracommunity trade.) Table 5.4
Shares and rankings of regional economic communities in intracommunity exports and imports, 1994–2000 (%)
Regional economic
community Share of exports Rank Share of imports Rank
SADC 31.1 1 30.2 1
ECOWAS 19.8 2 20.9 2
CEN-SAD 12.8 3 13.3 3
COMESA 9.3 4 9.5 4
UMA 8.6 5 8.8 5
UEMOA 5.9 6 5.6 6
EAC 4.7 7 4.2 8
IGAD 4.4 8 4.6 7
ECCAS 1.3 9 1.3 9
CEMAC 1.1 10 1.1 10
IOC 0.7 11 0.3 11
CEPGL 0.1 12 0.1 12
MRU 0.1 12 0.1 12
Total 100.0 100.0
Note: Given the significant component of the trade sector in the calculation of the indices, SACU was excluded from this table. SACU’s published trade data are usually aggregated and cannot be used for the calculations.
Source: Economic Commission for Africa, compiled from IMF 2001.
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