ACP member States vow to shore up intra-trade to 10pc
SUMMIT: Africa, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) economic bloc has moved to cement trade ties among member States by purposing to formerly set up air and sea trade links.
President Uhuru Kenyatta, who made the revelation at the closing ceremony of the three-day ninth edition of the ACP Heads of State Summit in Nairobi, said the trade links presented a clear opportunity to enable the private sector to generate wealth by leveraging on the bloc’s economic strength.
The bloc consists of 79 countries out of which 48 are from sub-Sahara Africa, 16 from the Caribbean and 15 from the Pacific.
Growth targets
“The air and sea links will be the first step in realising our trading goal of increasing ACPs share of trade from the current three per cent to 10 per cent in the next 10 years,” said Uhuru.
This was part of a raft of resolutions arrived at by the heads of state. Others included promotion of multilateralism, with the heads of state calling upon the 12 member World Trade Ministerial Conference, that will be held in Kazakhstan in June 2020, to provide a meaningful way forward on the preservation of multilateral trading system.
The summit also recognised the threat of climate change, urging member countries to be champions climate change mitigation by highlighting its seriousness in every international forum they participated in.
While urging for closer co-operation amongst its members to boost intra-ACP trade, Uhuru revealed that an endowment fund had been established to ensure sustainability of the 79 member economic bloc, with Kenya, Ghana and Papua New Guinea pledging instant support.
“I thank Papua New Guinea and Ghana for their pledge to support this endowment fund and I am also pleased to say that Kenya as chair of the group has also pledged $500,000 (Sh50.6 million) towards this fund,” he said.
