How Africa’s free trade network leaves smaller traders behind

The African Continental Free Trade Area is the African Union’s attempt to create a single continental market for goods and services. Signed in 2018 and operational for trading purposes from January 2021, the agreement now covers a prospective market of 1.4 billion people and about $3.4 trillion in combined gross domestic product. To date, 50 African countries have ratified the agreement, leaving only Eritrea outside the agreement. Yet the quixotic nature of African commerce haunts this grand amb