Given the challenges associated with the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), the Chief Executive Officer of the Chamber of Agribusiness Ghana, Anthony Morrison believes that the full benefits of the trade pact might not be realized in this current generation.
According to the CEO, the challenges of AfCFTA which are militating against its seamless implementation are enormous adding that it will take about 30 years for even half of what the trade agreement promises to be realized.
Citing some of the challenges his chamber grapples with in an attempt to transport the food across the sub-region under AfCFTA, Mr. Morrison noted that transportation across borders takes time due to bad road networks and border bureaucracies.
These delays cause huge losses as many of the food products go to waste.
“Our challenge is first, the food trade movement. Even between Ghana and Nigeria, how long does it take to even move food from Ghana’s border to Nigeria’s border and how long even at the border does it take you to cross to Nigeria’s market? We need to look at the food trade area very importantly,” he explained.
The lack of a harmonized tax system, the chamber mentioned also plays a significant role in preventing the full potential of AfCFTA. According to the CEO, the numerous different taxes at various borders make food expensive by the time they reach their destination.
With these huge and numerous taxes, some traders prefer to sell in their home country rather than transport to other countries under the AfCFTA.
We also need to look at the West Africa Tax harmonization because at every point in time you a paying tax for the movement of food. That is all adding up in the food price build-up in both countries so at the end of the day, it’s making your food more expensive while entering another country so you are better off selling in Ghana at a discounted price so that you stop going all other encumbrances and challenges you have to go through,” Mr. Morrison revealed.
He therefore indicated with these and many other challenges, the anticipated benefits of AfCFTA will take decades to materialize if these challenges are not resolved.
He said, “AfCFTA will not happen probably in our lifetime. When the European Union started it took them years before they actualized where they are today. It will take 30 years for us to do even half of what AfCFTA is promising but then we must start from a place. It’s very important a lot of measures are being taken to mitigate and integrate some of the areas that are challenges to the agriculture sector.”
