By Chinenye Offor
Mr Francis Anatogu, Secretary, National Action Committee on implementation of African Continental Free Trade Area (AFCTA) says the Council of AfCFTA Ministers have agreed to commence trade .
Anatogu, said this in an interview with the News News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Friday in Abuja.
He said that the agreement reached by the council of ministers was based on the agreed rules of origin to fast-track the commencement of actual trade.
Anatogu added that this would pave way for State Parties to gazette the legal instruments needed at the national level to introduce procedures enabling customs departments to operate under the new regime.
According to Anatogu, It has been acknowledged that the gains from AfCFTA will only materialise through comprehensive and sustainable implementation focused on outcomes.
He said in this regard, Nigeria had established the National Action Committee on AfCFTA to coordinate the implementation.
“The committee has developed a national implementation strategy with specific interventions to drive our mission and strategic objectives for AfCFTA.
” We have also developed a result management framework to ensure that our efforts are focused on achieving tangible outcomes.
“The strategy and results management frameworks are currently being validated with policy and regulation agencies prior to approval by the Federal Executive Council.
“Our national strategy envisions leveraging AfCFTA to make our states, cities and communities economically viable and resilient through intra-Africa trade.
“Our mission is to become the preferred supplier of value-added products and services to Africa, ” he said
Anatogu said that the strategic objective was to capture 10 per cent of Africa’s imports from the world to double Nigeria’s export revenue by 2035. ( NAN)
