Our region is ripe for business, our youthful workforce is hungry for success. However, access to competitive opportunities for sustainable growth remains a major setback.
In a flagship project, African Heads of State are pushing for the region to establish a single African market to facilitate the free movement of people, goods and services across the continent to accelerate growth.
One foundational event has been laying the groundwork for this goal for the past three years: The Intra-African Trade Fair. Côte d’Ivoire was given the chance to host it this year but fell short at the last minute. What happened? And what can we learn?
Case study: Côte d’Ivoire and the 2023 Intra-African Trade Fair
In March 2022, Côte d’Ivoire formally agreed to host the 3rd Intra-African Trade Fair (IATF2023). This pan-African multi-day event consists of eight programmes: exhibition, conference, business-to-business and business-to-government exchanges, country day, virtual IATF, creative Africa Nexus, African automotive show and AU youth startup. The Fair’s goal is to showcase African goods and services while expanding business and investment opportunities on the continent.
IATF2023 will be the third edition of this African premier trade and investment event; the second edition, held in 2021 in Durban, South Africa, resulted in over $42.1 billion in trade and investment deals, and saw over 32,500 attendees from 128 countries across Africa and beyond.
The IATF has emerged as a significant platform for promoting trade and investment across the continent. Since its inception, the event has been instrumental in fostering economic integration and strengthening intra-African commerce.
At the signing ceremony in Abidjan, the Ivoirian Minister of Commerce stressed the context in which IATF is being held in Côte d’Ivoire and its importance for the country.
“This 3rd edition of the Intra-African Trade Fair will allow Côte d’Ivoire to increase its influence in Africa, President Alassane Ouattara has declared IATF2023 the event of the year in our country.” – Souleymane Diarrassouba the Minister of Commerce, Industry and SME promotion of the Republic of Côte d’Ivoire.
IATF2023 was expected to be a lucrative platform for businesses relying on the cocoa sector as the host country, Côte d’Ivoire, is the largest cocoa producer in the world, averaging more than 2 million tonnes of cocoa a year — that’s around 45% of the global production. However, around 80% of Côte d’Ivoire’s national cocoa production is exported to Europe as cocoa beans, leaving the African market entirely.
The expertise of the local chocolate industry was expected be on full display at the IATF, making it a unique opportunity for businesses to learn from Ivorian chocolatiers as well as cocoa producers coming from all over the continent. Commercial exchanges between cocoa producers from different African countries can help the continent increase its processing capacity and add value to its raw materials.
This year as organizers were gearing up to kickoff preparations for the Fair, they received a notice from the government of Côte d’Ivoire that it was no longer able to host the continental event due to difficulties in importing semi-permanent structures and in complying with certain hosting requirements.
The event has formally been relocated from Abidjan to Cairo, Egypt.
This missed opportunity shows that we must take a holistic approach to welcome business and bolster economic growth. By adequately preparing for these rare opportunities, we are able to show the world the economic strength that inherently lies within West Africa.
