Despite Africa’s comparative income in agriculture, it accounts for the smallest allotment of worldwide agricultural commerce
NEWS ANALYSIS | RONALD MUSOKE | The African Continental Free Alternate Role Secretariat and the Alliance for a Inexperienced Revolution in Africa (AGRA) have sealed a brand contemporary partnership aimed at accelerating intra-African agricultural commerce, in a transfer that comes in opposition to the backdrop of worsening meals insecurity and rising pressure to remodel Africa’s flagship commerce settlement into tangible financial gains.
Signed on Feb. 14 on the margins of the thirty ninth African Union Summit in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital, the Memorandum of Working out between the AfCFTA Secretariat and AGRA alerts a deliberate shift from coverage create to implementation, with agriculture positioned on the centre of Africa’s commerce and boost agenda.
The settlement used to be formalized by AfCFTA Secretary-Now not fresh Wamkele Mene and AGRA President Alice Ruhweza, who framed the partnership as a decisive step toward translating the AfCFTA’s neutral architecture into functional outcomes for farmers, agribusinesses and buyers.
“The AfCFTA presents Africa a historical opportunity to shift from exporting raw commodities to building regional fee chains that create jobs, elevate farmer incomes and enhance meals security,” Mene talked about. “Our partnership with AGRA is set transferring from ambition to execution, guaranteeing that agricultural commerce delivers tangible advantages for producers, processors and buyers all over the continent.”
A pivotal 2nd for implementation
The partnership comes at a indispensable juncture for the African Continental Free Alternate Role. Established in 2018, the AfCFTA seeks to create a single continental marketplace for items and services and products, promote financial integration among African Union member states and seriously boost intra-African commerce.
With 50 nations having already ratified the settlement, the foremost focus is now shifting from neutral commitments to functional delivery; particularly in agriculture, a sector that employs a majority of Africans and underpins meals security.
The AfCFTA Agri-Alternate Action Opinion outlines interventions alongside side reducing non-tariff barriers, bettering commerce facilitation, selling fee addition and mobilizing funding in regional agricultural fee chains. The partnership with AGRA is designed to reduction operationalize these measures on the ground.
For AGRA, an African-led institution that has labored since 2006 to scale agricultural innovations for smallholder farmers all over 12 nations, the collaboration aligns carefully with its mandate to get farmer incomes and enhance meals security thru inclusive agricultural transformation.
“Alternate is now not going to transform Africa’s meals systems except farmers and agri-enterprises are ready to invent competitively, meet international effective requirements, and fix to legit markets,” Ruhweza talked about. “This partnership is set making intra-African meals commerce work in be conscious — linking coverage to delivery so that agriculture becomes a driver of inclusive boost, resilience and shared prosperity.”
A sobering meals security landscape
The urgency of the partnership is underscored by the findings of the 2025 Africa Agriculture Alternate Be conscious (AATM) teach, which paints a stark image of Africa’s meals and commerce vulnerabilities.
In step with the teach, practical and extreme meals insecurity all over Africa has risen sharply over the previous decade– by 30% and 32% respectively. In their foreword to the teach, Ousmane Badiane of AKADEMIYA2063 and Johan Swinnen of the Global Food Coverage Analysis Institute set aside that undernourishment now affects 20.2% of Africa’s inhabitants — a 2.8 percentage level prolong since 2019 — leaving 73 million additional people going thru practical or extreme meals insecurity.
Mighty of the deterioration occurred between 2019 and 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, geopolitical tensions, commerce wars, the Russia-Ukraine war, financial slowdown, local climate commerce and political instability. Dilapidated domestic agrifood systems have compounded the shock. Against this backdrop, commerce is presented now not as a peripheral convey but as central to reversing the boost.
Africa’s commerce paradox
Yet, despite its comparative income in agriculture, Africa accounts for the smallest allotment of worldwide agricultural commerce. The continent stays carefully dependent on imports — particularly cereals, oils and sugar — even as it exports fruits, nuts and frail cash plants.
High tariff levels and restricted diversification of import suppliers have increased vulnerability to global disruptions. Even supposing intra-African agricultural commerce has tripled between 2003 and 2023, Africa stays structurally reliant on meals imports from out of doors the continent.
Regional commerce patterns also demonstrate imbalances. Southern Africa dominates exports of cereals, dairy, meat and processed foods, while North Africa files surpluses in fish, fruits and vegetables. Central, West and East Africa stay secure meals importers, running persistent commerce deficits.
The AATM calls for accelerated implementation of the AfCFTA thru streamlined customs procedures, lowered non-tariff barriers and targeted funding to take care of structural production gaps — precisely the areas the contemporary AfCFTA–AGRA partnership goals to model out.
Rice and fertilizer: Strategic pressure points
Rice stands out as a strategic vulnerability. Africa has constantly been a secure importer of rice, with the commodity accounting for roughly a quarter of the continent’s cereals commerce deficit between 2019 and 2023. Question is projected to rise like a flash due to inhabitants boost, urbanisation and rising incomes, while provide boost is anticipated to ride on myth of low yields, inefficient practices and local climate pressures.
By 2035, Africa is anticipated to be the world’s finest rice-importing diagram. At the identical time, fertilizer utility rates in Africa are among the lowest globally, contributing to light slice yields. Even supposing the continent is a secure exporter of fertilizer — with foremost producers in North Africa — most fertilizer consumed domestically is imported.
The teach finds an even correlation between fertilizer use and cereal yields, and a foul relationship between fertilizer consumption and meals insecurity. Enhancing intra-African fertilizer commerce could perchance well perchance therefore enhance resilience and boost productivity — offered barriers are addressed and provide chains are integrated.
The AATM’s overview of regional commerce agreements suggests that practically all African regional financial communities are performing as building blocks toward continental integration, particularly below the AfCFTA. Nonetheless, integration stays uneven.
While tariffs within regional blocs are usually low or nonexistent, tariffs and non-tariff barriers between blocs stay excessive. Infrastructure deficits, fragmented regulatory frameworks and inconsistent enforcement of commerce provisions continue to limit the chunky realization of the AfCFTA’s promise. To release its chunky likely, the teach argues, Africa must lower inter-regional barriers, deepen neutral commitments, harmonise requirements and make investments in commerce-enabling infrastructure.
From framework to farmer
It’s within this coverage and financial landscape that the AfCFTA–AGRA partnership takes on strategic significance. For AfCFTA, the collaboration represents an effort to embed agricultural transformation on the center of continental commerce integration – shifting from commodity exports toward fee-added regional provide chains. For AGRA, it presents an avenue to link farm-level productivity and innovation on to continental markets, guaranteeing that smallholder farmers, alongside side millions of females smitten by fee chains such as rice, need to now not left slack.
Together, the institutions purpose to translate excessive-level commerce commitments into functional, farmer-centred motion. By aligning commerce coverage reforms with productivity gains, effective requirements and market bring collectively admission to, the partnership seeks to verify intra-African agricultural commerce becomes a driver of inclusive boost in ranking 22 situation of a theoretical aspiration.
As the AfCFTA Secretary-Now not fresh, Mene, put it, the 2nd calls for transferring “from ambition to execution”. And as Ruhweza emphasised, success is dependent upon making commerce “work in be conscious”. With meals insecurity rising, import dependence deepening and global provide chains an increasing selection of hazardous, the alliance between the AfCFTA Secretariat and AGRA alerts a recognition that Africa’s meals future will hinge now not finest on what it grows — but on how successfully it trades with itself. If applied successfully, the partnership could perchance well perchance designate a decisive step toward remodeling the AfCFTA from a neutral milestone into a cornerstone of agricultural resilience and shared prosperity all over the continent.
The submit Fresh AfCFTA-AGRA alliance targets farmer-centered intra-African commerce regarded first on The Self sustaining Uganda:.
