The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) was launched in January 2021 and it commits signatories to removing tariffs on 90% of goods for other signatories, to progressively liberalize trade in services, and to address other non-tariff barriers. All African countries but Eritrea are signatories, and, 44 countries out of 54 have ratified the agreement as of October 2022.
Digital platforms will be crucial to the success of the AfCFTA because the success of related digital platforms will also be instrumental in building intra-African supply chains. That is why it’s important to invest in the start-up ecosystem in Africa to spur innovation of digital platforms that will revolutionalize the whole process.
Digital Adoption Drives resilience and requires integrating digital tools into every layer of the organization, rather than adding them as an afterthought. Digital initiatives will drive post-COVID growth and are crucial to help companies remain financially stable as well as to drive revenue and profits.
Without digital adoption, there’s a real risk that the new digital services will drive customers away instead of attracting and retaining them. Many consumers are unfamiliar with digital processes, payments, and portals and are struggling to master them. Patience and goodwill are already in short supply thanks to the stresses of the pandemic; therefore, no one is willing to invest extra effort in working out how to use a confusing digital tool.
Digital adoption helps smoothly onboard customers to new digital platforms, replacing friction and frustration with delight. Crossborder paperless Trade is definitely a big boost. Paperless trade can reduce complexity by eliminating the need for copies of the same document, as well as making electronic and immediate transmission of those same documents possible.
“Even partial implementation of cross-border paperless trade measures could see an export
increase of US$ 36 billion annually In Africa.