Trade Bloc Strategy for Africa

Various trade bloc initiatives have been deployed within Africa to facilitate efficient regional and scaled-up intra-continental trade, and in a nutshell, the regional trade bloc initiatives—usually referred to as the Regional Economic Communities (RECs)—include the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS); the Economic Community for Central African States (ECCAS); the East African Community (EAC); the Community of Sahel-Saharan States (CEN-SAD), the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA); the Arab Maghreb Union (UMA); the South African Development Community (SADC); the Inter-governmental Authority on Development (IGAD). Whereas the scaled-up intra-continental is the recently-commenced African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). There will be terse discussion, herein, of the aforementioneds, followed by proposal and discussion of a novel initiative.

1. INTRA-CONTINENTALS

Regarding the regionals, rankings by the 2019 African Regional Integration Index (ARII) and the 2025 African Integration Report (with the aid of the updated African Synthesised Regional Integration Index—ASRII) place the East African Community (EAC) at an approximate 0.54/1.0. The East African Community possesses the highest efficiency, advancement, and integration in Africa—integration in the form of the 2005 customs union, and the 2010 common market protocol. It also possesses the highest intra-trade intensity at approximately 18 to 22%; the strongest institutions, including the East African Court of Justice (EACJ) and the East African Legislative Assembly (EALA); the highest execution on infrastructure corridors, including the northern corridor—linking Mombasa port to Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, and DRC—the central corridor—linking Dar es Salaam to Rwanda, Burundi, and Uganda—the namanga corridor, the sirari corridor, among others; the highest efficiency free movement pilots—under the common market protocol—including the one-stop border posts, waiving of work permit fees for EAC citizens from Kenya, Uganda, and Rwanda, and acceptance of machine-readable identification cards for cross-border travel.

The aforestated rankings place the Arab Maghreb Union (UMA) at an approximate 0.49/1.0. Covering Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Libya, and Morocco, this bloc is however largely inactive, and the main pitfalls contributing to its inefficiency include: the political tensions between some of the member countries—including the 1994-till-present tensions between Algeria and Morocco, resulting in border closure; minimal trade liberalisation, resulting in very low (under 3%) intra-bloc trade; absence of a customs union; absence of a dispute management mechanism; non-existence of an operational free trade area. There are however shared infrastructure ambitions, for example the Maghreb gas pipeline plans.

The Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS) is ranked at an approximate 0.44/1.0. Encompassing eleven countries, it’s however plagued by various encumbrances including: conflicts between the member states—for instance, the ongoing conflicts between Rwanda and Burundi, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo; unaddressed, horrible infrastructure and connectivity between the member states; low institutional capacity; low intra-bloc trade (under 5%). Nevertheless, it has shared resource management frameworks with regard to oil and timber.

Similar in ranking, at 0.44/1.0, to the ECCAS, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) is, however, plagued by little to no focus on trade—with intra-bloc trade at less than 8%; high tensions between the member countries—for instance, the current tensions between Ethiopia and Somalia, and those between Eritrea and Ethiopia; an absence of strong economic programs; horrible free movement pilots—resulting in logistical nightmares like the indirect overland trade routes between South Sudan and Somalia. On a lighter note, the IGAD undertakes immense co-operation on existential issues like drought.

The Economic Community for West African States (ECOWAS), ranking at 0.43/1.0, has made more traction on the free movement pilots than has the UMA, ECCAS, and IGAD by implementing the ECOWAS passport to simplify travel between the member states. Intra-ECOWAS trade, promisingly, wavers between 12 and 15%. There are also numerous peacekeeping efforts among the members, and attempts at a custom union. Despite all these attempts at operating a strategically sound REC, the region is however plagued by currency non-convertibility between many of the members, and tensions between some of the member states.

The Community of Sahel-Saharan States (CEN-SAD), ranking at 0.38/1.0, grapples with scanty and shallow integration, less of a focus on trade and more of a focus on security. It encompasses thirty countries but simply wields the potential for impactful broad coverage, and witnesses conflict between some of the member states. Inter-bloc trade is unfortunately less than 5%, and the devised economic programmes remain unimplemented.

The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), ranking at 0.37/1.0, competes with the CEN-SAD with regard to the number of member states (twenty one). Intra-COMESA trade hovers around 10 to 12%. Nevertheless, it also simply wields the potential for impactful broad coverage, and is plagued by un-even implementation and infrastructure gaps. Despite all that, there have been attempts at establishing a free trade area, and the occasional execution of joint-macro economic policies.

The Southern African Development Community (SADC), covering sixteen countries, ranks at 0.34/1.0—making it the lowest ranked in Africa. The SADC’s 2008 free trade area has made significant steps. Intra-SADC trade is approximately 15%, characterised by South African manufactured goods and supply of raw materials by many of the other members. SADC is also plagued by the highest amounts of bureaucracy and regulation on the continent, an asphyxiated immigration environment, and unaddressed infrastructure gaps.

Across all the aforementioned RECs, non-tariff barriers (NTBs) persist—in varying quantities, and overlapping memberships contribute to conflicting rules. Varied efforts like the 2012 Boosting Intra-African Trade (BIAT) Action Plan, and the Tripartite FTA (involving the COMESA, EAC, and SADC) have been attempted, in vain, to grapple with some of the aforestated shortcomings. Additionally, to deal with the fragmented nature of the RECs and to achieve a scaled-up, all-encompassing trade bloc aimed at increasing market access for all African countries across the continent, the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) was launched in 2018/19. It is however plagued by high amounts of bureaucracy, delays, lowest-common-denominator concerns, and rules in conflict with the various existing RECs. As of 2026, five years after trading started, actual use of AfCFTA preferences is extremely low, with many countries continuing under REC preferences. The AfCFTA is also currently characterised by the frequently-promised, un-acted-upon adjustment fund, the questionable guided-trade initiative involving eight pilot countries, and low execution.

2. BLOCS MELIORATED

In this section, I’d like to propose an alternative approach to the aforementioned efforts at rectifying the shortcomings faced by many of the RECs—an approach that, as well, serves as an alternative to the all-encompassing AfCFTA. I’ll call this approach the Accelerated EAC Vanguard Strategy—a strategic supply of the high-standard EAC model, an approach devoid of lowest-common-denominator flaws, one involving the rapid expansion of the EAC, with Kenya as continental pacesetter.

Considering that the EAC is Africa’s only REC with an operational customs union and common market, the highest intra-bloc trade at an approximate 18 to 22% of members’ total trade, the strongest institutions, the highest scores on the ASRII, and that avoids many of the chronic delivery failures (NTBs, weak enforcement, funding shortfalls) which all the other RECs face and that the AfCFTA has replicated at a continental scale, the smartest and punctual route to real trade gains would not be to abandon or dilute the EAC, but to turn the EAC into Africa’s proven “vanguard” bloc that demonstrates what works, and then exports its tools upward.

The tentative blueprint of the Accelerated EAC Vanguard Strategy can be briefly condensed as follows:

Enforcement and Funding Mechanisms

Enforcement can be approached as simply as: implementing automatic sanctions for non-compliance—for example suspension of voting rights, withholding of infrastructure funds. It can also be ensured that there is an annual public “integration scorecard” with a private-sector veto on underperforming governments. While funding mechanisms can simply take the path of the new EAC infrastructure and industrialisation fund being seeded by privatisation proceeds, green bonds, and private-sector equity.

The Accelerated EAC Vanguard Strategy vanquishes the pitfalls plaguing many of the RECs and the AfCFTA, while offering an all-encompassing solution and achieving real trade gains.