Ghana develops its own National AfCFTA implementation strategy

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Developed by the AfCFTA Inter-Ministerial Committee, the National AfCFTA Steering Committee and seven Technical Working Groups that comprised of representatives from the private sector, Senior Government Officials, and other technical experts, thee government of Ghana has adopted a National AfCFTA Policy Framework and Action Plan to guide the interventions needed to harmonise the existing laws, programmes, policies, and regulations with the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) regulatory framework.

The purpose of the document, which serves as AfCFTA national implementation strategy, is to boost Ghana’s trade with the other African countries under the new Free Trade Area framework and create the enabling environment to ensure its successful implementation in the country. To this end, the Ghana National AfCFTA Policy Framework and Action Plan identifies the strategic objectives that the country plans to implement with particular regard to trade facilitation, trade policy, infrastructure, the enhancement of productive capacity of Ghanaian enterprises, trade information, market integration and finance.

As it is known, during the Conference of African Ministers of Finance, Planning and Economic Development held in Addis Ababa in May 2018, the African Union member States have been urged to prepare national strategies and implementation plans to identify opportunities, constraints and actions related to the AfCFTA implementation. However, so far most African States have been late in developing these strategies, and also those who have adopted them, in many cases have not made them publicly available.

So far, the countries that have proven to be more active in the publication of such strategies are the West and Central African countries. After Cote d'Ivoire, Cameroon, and Nigeria (read more here) now also Ghana has made its AfCFTA implementation strategy public. Zambia, on the other hand, it seems has published its strategy on the website of the Ministry of Trade and Industry. Such a pity that the link to the document (as all the documents in the same page) is broken.