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Status Check: Progress on the AfCFTA and Synergising Infrastructure, Trade and Digital Expansion
When: November 8, 2023
Location: GTR Africa 2023
 

London, UK

People: Simon Cook

Simon Cook moderated a panel discussion titled "Status Check: Progress on the AfCFTA and Synergising Infrastructure, Trade and Digital Expansion" at Global Trade Review's (GTR) Africa 2023 Conference: Exploring Africa’s Opportunities Through Trade, Finance and Innovation, to be held in London.

The session looked at the steps policymakers and financiers need to take to accelerate the integration of African trade economies, and the delivery of trade-enabling infrastructure, examine the latest progress on AfCFTA domestification, the next stages of protocol agreements, and look at the actions needed to see cross-border trade on AfCFTA rules take flight.

How this might evolve, the appetite for trade financiers and de-risk African lending was considered to help narrow the SME trade finance gap. Likewise, panellists explored financing needs for physical infrastructure including roads, ports and logistics, and how project finance from banks, DFIs and ECAs can be fine-tuned to enable the AfCFTA.

An update on digital solutions to cross-border trade payments was also considered, with a number of innovations taking flight, including the Pan-African Payment and Settlement System, and Central Bank Digital Currencies, for which some pilots are currently underway.