Buhari inaugurates committee on AfCFTA
News & Trends •
your task as members of the impact and readiness assessment of the african continental free trade area committee is to address the issues raised during the stakeholders consultations on the africa continental free trade agreement1 president muhammadu buhari on monday inaugurated the presidential committee for impact and readiness assessment of the african continental free trade area afcfta1 the president said nigeria would henceforth take its time to breakaway from the past practice where treaties were signed without making the needed positive gains for the country1 the committee has the minister of industry as its chairman with the chief of staff to the president as co-chairman1 buhari said we are determined to breakaway from the past practice of committing nigeria to treaties without a definite implementation plan to actualise the expected benefit while mitigating the risks1 we cannot go back to the days of signing agreements without understanding and planning for the consequences of such actions and our country being the worst for it1 few months ago i directed a nationwide stakeholders engagement on the africa free trade continental area agreement to understand the true impact of this agreement on nigeria and nigerians considering the existing domestic and regional policies as it relates to trade1 the president observed that from the consultation the key issues raised by stakeholders were abuse of rules of origin smuggling arising from difficulties in border controls and unqualified impact of legacy preferential trade agreements1 according to him other issues raised include low capacity and capability of local businesses to conduct international trade costly finance and insufficient energy and transport logistics infrastructure1 he however revealed that the nations economic recovery and growth plan would address these issues1 buhari therefore charged the committee to concentrate on the issues raised during the nationwide consultations in order to find lasting solutions to them1 at the event at the presidential villa abuja buhari said that nigeria would not sign any treaty without assessing its impact on the lives of its citizens1 you are expected to develop short medium and long term measures that will address any challenges arising therefrom he added1 the president further stated that nigerias vision for intra-african trade was for a free movement of made in africa goods noting that nigeria was the largest economy in africa1 he regretted that for too long the countrys domestic productive capabilities were neglected in favour of imports1 according to him the economic recovery and growth plan introduced by the current administration will help revive key job creating and import substitution sectors like agriculture mining and manufacturing1 speaking earlier minister of industry trade and investment dr okechukwu enelamah gave the terms of reference of the committee1 he said these included assessing the potential cost and impact of the afcta for nigeria in relation to the benefits identify the short medium and long term measure to prepare nigerian businesses for the take-off of afcta trading group1 he said the terms of reference also included a backup plan that covers selected scenarios and view the trade remedy options to safeguard the nigerian economy from predatory and failed trade practices1 according to the minister an updated trade policy is being prepared for nigeria and the draft will be ready for review by the end of the year1 other members of the committee include ministers of budget and national planning foreign affairs finance and the attorney-general and minister of justice1 the economic adviser to the president nigerian governors forum president nigerian association of chambers of commerce and industry and president nigeria labour congress among others are also members of the committee1