AfCFTA overview and possible ways for the US Congress to increase US support to the initiative

A report from the Congressional Research Service (CRS), a legislative branch agency within the Library of Congress that provides comprehensive legislative research and analysis in order to contribute to an informed national legislature in United States, recapitulates the initiatives developed by the various international organizations and governments so far to support the African Union (AU) and in particular, the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) negotiations and implementation. The report recognises that the US funding in support of the AfCFTA is significantly lower than that provided by some other donors (notably the EU), but also that the technical assistance provided by such donors has to date focused heavily on the AfCFTA Secretariat and various AUC departments, rather than at the national and regional level, where additional support is needed to help national governments and regional organisations to address AfCFTA implementation challenges. The US Congress is urged to consider the development of mechanisms aimed at fostering greater coordination among and with all partners supporting the continental FTA. To this end, an official cooperative forum, formally involving AfCFTA and development partner officials (e.g., from the EU and U.S.), could act as a channel to clarify African needs and address capacity gaps to be filled with additional assistance.

According to the CRS report, particularly important is the role played by the European Union (EU), a major donor to AfCFTA support efforts, which provided assistance for the development of the African Trade Observatory (ATO) to help track AfCFTA implementation, regional integration, and tariff negotiations. The EU provided a total of €74 million for support during 2014-2020, and further assistance remains ongoing. This includes support for facilitating the AfCFTA negotiation process; AfCFTA advocacy and country ratification; tariff classification harmonization and strengthening of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR); development of AfCFTA national implementation strategies; rules of origin implementation by African customs services; SPS system capacity-building; and establishing regional geographical indications for products.

Other organisations that play a key role in the AU and AfCFTA support are the UN Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) and the International Trade Centre (ITC). UNECA created a guide to spearhead the development by AU members, of AfCFTA national implementation strategies, and has partnered with the AfCFTA Secretariat to promote trade as a stimulus for post-COVID-19 economic recovery efforts. The ITC, a multilateral agency with a joint mandate with the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the UN, developed the “SheTrades AfCFTA” program to build the capacity of women-owned businesses to trade under the AfCFTA.

Other international support for the AfCFTA has been offered by the UK government (that signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the AfCFTA Secretariat in September 2021 to support AfCFTA implementation and African intra-regional trade and investment); the German-government-owned development corporation, GIZ (that administers programs to assist with AfCFTA negotiation preparation and implementation, policy research and advice, and stakeholder outreach and training), the government of Canada, which is funding a $15 million program for UNECA’s African Trade Policy Centre to support AfCFTA development, and Denmark, that is funding a $3.8 million program for AU AfCFTA-implementing institutions and UNECA. In October 2021, the AfCFTA Secretariat and the Chinese government signed an MoU establishing an expert group on cooperation. This group is expected to collaborate in areas that will include experience-sharing on intellectual property rights, customs procedures, digital trade and competition policy.

In addition to AfCFTA-specific assistance, other institutions provide estimates of African countries’ broader trade facilitation progress and gaps. For example, the WTO maintains a database on WTO member countries’ implementation of WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA) commitments, which share AfCFTA’s goals of lowering trade costs and improving customs operations. The WTO also provides technical assistance and capacity building for developing and least-developed country members to aid with TFA implementation.