Intra-Comesa trade up, now at $21 billion

Intra-regional trade in the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa) has steadily risen from $3 billion to $20.9 billion since the establishment of a Free Trade Area (FTA) in 2000.

This, however, excludes the informal trade across the borders that currently goes largely unrecorded but which has been estimated at over 30 per cent of formal trade.

According to the 2013 status report presented to the Comesa Intergovernmental Committee (IC) in Lusaka, Zambia last week, intra-Comesa trade is still low partly due to the similar products that compete for the same market within the member States and the existence of Non-Tariff Barriers (NTBs).

Other regions

For example, last year, intra-Comesa trade was recorded at 7 per cent as compared to other regions such as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) that have recorded 25 per cent intra-regional trade.

In his address while opening the IC meeting, Zambia Commerce and Industry Minister Bob Sichinga said that focus should now be put on addressing the bottlenecks to intra-regional trade, such as NTBs, supply-side constraints, border measures that affect and impact on volumes and values of intra-trade.

“It is incumbent upon all the stakeholders to address these bottlenecks to sustain the momentum thus far achieved, deepen Comesa’s integration agenda beyond the FTA, and attain a fully functional common market by 2018,” he told the IC meeting which is comprised of Permanent Secretaries from member States.

Sichinga said Comesa had developed draft regulations to enable the region address intra-regional trade barriers under a legal framework such as the arbitrary imposition of barriers.