The AmCham Ghana AfCFTA Resource Centre, under the auspices of the American Chamber of Commerce, Ghana, and in partnership with the Africa Trade Academy, on March 3, 2023, hosted a training session on the topic, Expanding into African Markets: How to Export Under AfCFTA, to provide members with insight on the various aspects of the agreement to ensure optimization of the opportunities presented under the new free trade agreement.

AfCFTA is a high-ambition trade agreement with a comprehensive scope that includes critical areas of Africa’s economy. By eliminating barriers to trade in Africa, the agreement seeks to significantly boost intra-Africa trade, particularly trade in value-added production and trade across all sectors of Africa’s economy.

The instructor for the training session, Dode Seidu, took participants through the various processes of analyzing Africa’s market opportunities, researching African markets, and means of entering other African markets through AfCFTA.

Dodie noted that, for companies to trade under AfCFTA, they must be properly registered, have an exportable product, understand the market requirements of destination countries, know the tariff and non-tariff barriers to products, and be registered with Ghana National Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GNCCI) to obtain a certificate of origin.

He also shared insight on the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) Rules of Origin manual which serves as a guide to the operationalization of Annex 2 on Rules of Origin, an essential part of the AfCFTA.

For businesses to be able to succeed, Dode advised companies to pick the right entry strategy, understand the consumer base of the country they want to export to, use informal markets and capacity building by setting up extensive training programs to develop the skills of locals and integrate them into their business, and manage risk by building partnership with locals and engaging key stakeholders.

As governments, the AfCFTA secretariat, and other stakeholders strive to implement and fully operationalize the African Continental Free Trade Agreement, the AmCham Ghana AfCFTA Resource Centre is committed to hosting more engagements to provide members with vital information to succeed.

The AfCFTA Resource Centre was set up at the American Chamber of Commerce, Ghana, to serve as an information hub for U.S. businesses and provide a conducive environment for networking and partnership with Ghanaian companies to take advantage of the trade agreement.