Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Mr. Niyi Adebayo, said the vision of the Federal Government in signing the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) is free movement of goods within the African region.
Adebayo said this in at the AfCFTA National Forum, which held in Lagos last weekend.
The Forum, with the theme, ‘Effective Implementation for Industrialisation and Inclusive Economic Development in Nigeria’, was co-organised by the Nigerian Government, the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and in collaboration with the European Union (EU).
Other collaborators include the African Union (AU), Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN) and Nigerian Association of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, Mines and Agriculture (NACCIMA).
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“Our vision for intra-African trade is that of free movement of made in Africa goods. That is, goods and services made locally with significant African content in terms of raw materials and value addition.
“Nigeria’s vision for the AfCFTA is, therefore, free and fair intra-Africa trade that creates economic growth, wealth for investors and businesses, jobs and prosperity for our citizens,” he said.
The Minister said that from the studies done so far, Nigeria had established that the AfCFTA could facilitate economic growth and diversification, through preferential access to Africa’s market for manufactured goods and services.
He, however, pointed out that this could only be realised through addition of new production capacity, retooling and upscaling existing businesses and assisting those sectors that would be negatively impacted to migrate to new areas.
Adebayo also harped on prioritising the resolution of the bottlenecks that hinder the competitiveness in production and trade, including hard infrastructure such as power and logistics as well as soft infrastructure such as policies, regulations.
