What benefits does AfCFTA bring?

Our aim with AfCFTA is to create a single market for goods and services to bolster Africa’s economies. Togo is a gateway to West Africa and has vast potential for facilitating trade with other regions in Africa. We hope to increase intra-African trade, boost economic growth and create jobs for our women and youth.

What steps has Togo taken?

We initially invested in outreach efforts across the entire country to ensure that everyone understands what the agreement means for Togo. We spoke with our parliament, the private sector, civil society, students and journalists.

We have also held many national consultations with various constituencies. These include engaging with women entrepreneurs and cross-border traders as part of preparations for AfCFTA’s protocol on women and youth. We are now implementing recommendations resulting from those consultations, such as calling for action on removing obstacles to trade. We are also looking at how to increase awareness of AfCFTA-related trade opportunities among women entrepreneurs and to strengthen their capacity to seize these opportunities.

To support AfCFTA implementation, Togo has put a lot of effort into strengthening the country's institutional framework. We have trained customs officers, freight forwarders and women entrepreneurs on the conditions that goods must meet to be eligible to benefit from AfCFTA. We have also created a national AfCFTA Committee, which forms part of our national committee for international trade negotiations. We have already prepared Togo's schedule of tariff commitments and drafted commitments for five priority service sectors. We have also outlined Togo's non-tariff measures.

What are your future plans?

We will continue with institutional strengthening. We plan to update Togo's national AfCFTA implementation strategy and align it with the Togo 2025 roadmap, a five-year (2020-25) investment project initiated by the government. We will also continue implementing recommendations from our national consultations with women.

We also need support from the international community to fully implement our AfCFTA strategy. Togo needs an export promotion strategy that takes account of various standards and regulations. We also need to strengthen laboratories in charge of quality control for agricultural products for export.

In 2020, Togo was the sixth-largest exporter of phosphates, a natural resource used to produce fertilizers. However, Togo and neighbouring countries continue to import fertilizers from abroad. With the price of fertilizers rising, we plan to produce fertilizers in our own country and supply other markets in the region.

Togo’s services have strong export potential so we are working to improve the quality of these services. For example, Togo is an important transport hub. Our latest diagnostic trade integration study identified the need to invest in infrastructure and to improve the regulatory environment for transport and transiting goods.

Raising awareness about AfCFTA trade opportunities is essential. Ensuring women entrepreneurs have access to these opportunities is our priority. For example, we have launched in Togo the "50 Million African Women Speak" platform, a service aimed at helping African women grow their businesses by providing a one-stop shop for their information needs. We now need to train women entrepreneurs on how to use it.

We also need support to participate in more international trade fairs. These are important for enabling women entrepreneurs to access new business opportunities. In addition, facilitating the interconnectedness of banks across countries will help reduce the risk of theft when entrepreneurs are currently obliged to carry cash.

What lessons have you learned?

First, political will is essential. The government of Togo attaches great importance to regional economic integration and AfCFTA. Second, ensuring all stakeholders in Togo take ownership of AfCFTA is key. To this end, we have a team of negotiators and AfCFTA experts who regularly engage with our business communities. Finally, having a national AfCFTA implementation strategy offers a clear roadmap of the steps we must take to realize the opportunities presented by AfCFTA.