Story by Oleen Ndori, Foreign Desk Editor
Government has put in place adequate measures to benefit from the creation of a single market to drive the vision of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).
This came out at the Africa Prosperity Dialogues underway in Accra, Ghana.
With the challenge of lower intra-continental trade as well as various socio-political and economic setbacks, the economic blueprint under the AfCFTA aims to deliver sustainable growth on the continent.
Speaking during a panel discussion on energy and development within Africa, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Energy and Power Development, Engineer Gloria Magombo highlighted how Zimbabwe has partnered with the private sector to propel energy development.
“We have changed our legal and regulatory framework to come up with policies which will allow the private sector to come into the sector, develop projects and be able to sell both to the utility but also the private sector. We are saying as Africans, we need to go beyond being extractive and selling our minerals. Because the same renewable energies we are talking about need cobalt, they need lithium in storage, they need copper, they need nickel. Those are our key elements which will have been given by God. They are key to unlocking value from Africa if we can get partners who don’t extract raw minerals but add value to our own countries so that we remain and retain that value and build the capacity to fund our projects.
In the field of ICT, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of ICT, Postal and Courier Services, Dr Beaullah Chirume noted the need to create a borderless Africa through connectivity.
“Zimbabwe, we are on board, and we are saying within the framework of the African continental free trade area where we hope to achieve or to enhance intra-African trade and economic integration. It is therefore crucial for us to attain or achieve quality connectivity fostering on seamless, borderless, there shouldn’t be any difference between Ghana, Zimbabwe and the other countries, facilitating ease of doing business within our own African context, rather bring in trade efficiency and more collaboration.”
The country’s trade promotion body ZimTrade, is pushing for intra-continental trade.
“The dialogue here is pushing for enhanced trade and as Zimbabwe, we have made progress with various highways that are gateways to markets and that is what we are going for in order to increase trade within the continent,” noted ZimTrade’s chief executive officer, Mr Allan Majuru.
According to ZimTrade, trade within Africa stands at around 15-17%, noting the need to upscale it, while also applying value addition to the raw materials that are abundant on the continent.
