African Continental Free Trade Agreement

June 11, 2021

6th Annual Competition and Economic Regulation (ACER) Week

Online courses and call for papers

20 - 29 SEPTEMBER 2021

To support safe and stable market functioning, and to mitigate discordance and incompatibility risks, this paper proposes the establishment of a common set of Afro-market-centric foundational principles (“African Core Principles for Systemically Important Payment Systems”, or “Afro-SIPS Principles”) to provide a baseline framework of standards to which all African cross-border payment systems – including systemically important national payment systems – should adhere and incorporate into their applicable rulebooks and risk management frameworks.

The News and Events published every week include conferences, major developments in the field of International Economic Law in Africa at the national, sub-regional and regional levels as well as relevant case law.

Towards the end of 2020, the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), through its African Trade Policy Centre (ATPC), launched a training and research initiative on “Digital trade regulatory integration in Africa”, focusing on 11 pilot countries. Based on their background and expertise in the area, researchers from Cameroon, Chad, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia were selected to build two databases, for each of countries of focus, on various measures related to digital services trade regulations and digital trade integration, respectively.

The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) has been described as the most ambitious project for advancing economic integration on the African continent. The AfCFTA is the African Union’s framework to establish a single continental market for goods and services with free movement of capital and business travelers. AfCFTA presents a chance to defragment the African market, thus enhancing competitiveness and serving as a vehicle to support the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. It is against this backdrop that the Centre for African Legal Studies at the UPSA Law School (Ghana), in collaboration with the African Continental Free Trade Area Secretariat, is organizing the 1st Africa Trade Roundtable under the theme - “Advancing A Continental Market through the AfCFTA.”

May 21, 2021

10th Annual Conference of the society: Africa and International Trade Law

Call for Papers

May 19, 2021

Paid Short-term Consultancy: Investment Governance and Sustainable Development at the Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment

Key information:

In order to complete negotiations of the Phase II Protocol on Investment and prepare successful implementation of the agreement, the AfCFTA Secretariat requires assistance in the form of a technical expert on investment.

The News and Events published every week include conferences, major developments in the field of International Economic Law in Africa at the national, sub-regional and regional levels as well as relevant case law.

It is important that the Global South countries and particularly African countries device approaches that aim at entrenching integration in their own regions. This is absolutely crucial now that African States have the ambition of increasing intra- African trade. Secondly, African governments need to approach FTA and EPAs with the countries in Global North with extra caution and with their development needs, economic situations, and integration ambitions in mind.