Forty-eight African countries have finalized their tariff offers under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), bringing businesses across the continent closer to a more predictable system for accessing preferential tariffs when selling goods across borders.
Joyce Letswalo, head of the Market Access Division at the AfCFTA Secretariat, said the Secretariat has received 50 tariff-offer submissions, with 48 finalized and two undergoing verification as the continent moves from negotiating the trade agreement to implementing it.
The tariff offers set out the products that countries are opening to preferential trade and the pace at which tariffs will be eliminated.
“It’s a stage format. The countries exchange those offers and said we will have products that we will say for now we’re opening up, and they will have those that are sensitive and those that we can also open later for each other. So it’s a gradual opening up and elimination of the tariffs,” Letswalo said.
For companies, the process is intended to provide greater certainty over the duties they will face before shipping goods into another African market.
The tariff schedules identify products through descriptions and Harmonized System codes, allowing customs authorities and businesses to apply a common classification to goods.
“So that will make it easy to say, now on this particular product, this is the rate that we are offering each other. It’s a preferential rate we are offering each other,” Letswalo said.
The next step is domestic implementation. Countries that have adopted their tariff offers must also gazette them and incorporate the schedules into national customs systems before businesses can practically claim the preferential treatment at borders.
Letswalo said 26 countries had gazetted their tariff offers, making them public documents that businesses can use. “According to the latest notification, we have 26 countries, 26 countries, they have gazetted the tariff offers. So the tariff offers are now public documents,” she said.
Gazetting is important because an adopted tariff offer must be incorporated into a country’s domestic system before customs authorities can apply the agreed preferences. “Gazetting means we are able to put those tariff offers now actively into the system, the national systems,” Letswalo said.
The implementation process is also being phased according to countries’ development classifications. Letswalo said countries categorized as developed within the continent have already reached zero tariffs on 90% of their products, following a five-year phase-out period.
Countries considered less developed have been given 10 years to phase out tariffs, reflecting differences in their economic structures and capacity to adjust to increased competition.
The implementation is already generating trade activity. More than 12,000 certificates of origin have been notified to the AfCFTA Secretariat, according to Letswalo.
The certificates confirm the origin of goods traded under the agreement and are a key requirement for businesses seeking preferential treatment.
“Since 2021 and then with the injection of accelerating in 2022, October if you recall, we have recorded over 12,000 certificates of origin notified to the Secretariat,” Letswalo said.
The actual number of transactions could be higher because the figure covers certificates notified to the Secretariat, while businesses also conduct trade independently.
The expansion of market access could also support a shift toward greater value addition within Africa. Letswalo said the agreement creates an opportunity for producers to move beyond exporting unprocessed commodities and instead supply higher-value goods to consumers across the continent.
“We have certain systems and initiatives already in the regime itself on how to move towards a value addition,” she said.
The potential market extends beyond individual national economies. Letswalo described the AfCFTA market as access to about 1.47 billion potential customers across Africa.
“Within the African space, it means customers, because we have a population of 1.47 billion. So it means customers beyond a single country,” she said.
The remaining work is to bring all participating countries into the same implementation framework. Letswalo said the Secretariat continues to provide technical assistance to countries yet to finalize their tariff offers, with the objective of having all 55 countries participating in trade under the agreement.
The progress marks a significant shift in the AfCFTA process, from negotiating market-opening commitments to putting those commitments into national customs systems where businesses can use them.
