Central Africa Region : Boosting Integration, Investment

With 2.8 per cent of intra-regional trade, Central Africa is far below the continental average of 9 per cent but has significant potential to improve this score. For this to happen, it is necessary to operationalise the ECCAS-CEMAC free trade area, make the movement of goods and persons more effective, improve the efficiency of trade corridors, and integrate economic actors into competitive regional value chains. The above assessment was made during the first Steering Committee Meeting of the Support Programme to Regional Integration and to Investment in Central Africa (PAIRIAC) that held in Douala on Friday, February 3, 2023. The meeting was chaired by the Minister Delegate to the Minister of the Economy, Planning and Regional Development in charge of Planning, Paul Tasong. 
The overall goal of the programme is to reinforce regional integration and competitiveness in order to promote and accelerate growth, sustainable jobs in the central African region from the period May 2022 to April 2026. This will be done to strengthen the acceleration of regional integration, facilitate transhumance and pastoral mobility in the region and improve competitiveness in Central Africa, taking advantage of EU financial instruments, and contributing to the post-Covid 19 response strategy. To do this, ECCAS and CEMAC will be working in partnership with EU.
All these activities, funded to the tune of Euros 29.95 millions from the 11th European Development Fund (EDF), seek to address major issues and challenges pertaining to regional integration and competitiveness in Central Africa. These include, optimisi...