Examining the potential implications of the African Continental Free Trade Area on Intra-COMESA Trade

This article uses the structured gravity model to examine the potential effects of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) on trade within the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) region. The results show that liberalising trade through the AfCFTA has the potential effect of increasing intra-COMESA trade 1.96 times. Trade diversion is bound to occur with extra-COMESA imports expected to increase by 1.32 times. However, the formation of the AfCFTA is important for COMESA as it leads to an overall improvement in intra-COMESA trade by 88.89%. Furthermore, the results show pure trade creation effects, in terms of exports, suggesting an increase in the welfare of non-COMESA members. The article significantly contributes to the growing body of research on the ongoing deliberations on trade integration and regionalism. It further provides an exciting opportunity to advance extant knowledge by amalgamating trade indicators and model-based analysis to understand the implications of the establishment of the AfCFTA for African countries