This year’s edition of the Intra-African Trade Fair (IATF), which was held in Algiers, Algeria, last month was no ordinary continental event. This is because the proceedings went beyond the usual rites of announcing next host country for the continental exhibition.
The event saw the IATF Advisory Council Chairperson and former Nigerian President, Olusegun Obasanjo making three announcements. He informed that, going forward, the show which was being jointly run by the Afreximbank, the African Union (AU) Commission and the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) Secretariat would be institutionalised and run by an independent entity, the Intra-African Trade Fair Company (IATFCO). He further announced that the operations of the entity would be housed at its headquarters that would be hosted by Zimbabwe. The continental financial institution approved US$ million to capitalise the project.
Zimbabwe shrugged off very stiff competition from Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Malawi, Zambia, and South Africa to host the company. Obasanjo highlighted that Zimbabwe beat other countries because of “its conferencing facilities, robust air connectivity, accommodation capacity and pledged land for expansion.” The development came against the background of Zimbabwe already hosting the Harare Afreximbank Africa Trade Centre (HAATC), whose construction is almost complete.
When the news of Zimbabwe’s bidding victory reached the country, some people questioned how the development would benefit the nation. Some even quizzed the wisdom of offering to host the IATCO headquarters at a time that the country is going through some socio-economic challenges. These views were myopic. The people who held these views were obviously unaware that President Emmerson Mnangagwa, in his matchless wisdom, readily saw how the development would benefit and advance his economic diplomacy policy and simultaneously enhance the local tourism and events sector.
The benefits
For the record, hosting the continental show’s headquarters has more potential benefits for Zimbabwe than downsides.
Hosting a continental institution such as the IATFCO raises Zimbabwe’s profile on the African stage. It puts Harare on the map as a centre for trade, investment, and diplomacy. It may strengthen Zimbabwe’s influence in AfCFTA-related policy debates, trade negotiations, and regional integration agendas. Having the IATFCO in Zimbabwe is expected to nudge Government and other stakeholders to address the challenges, which are preventing the country from fully benefitting from the AfCFTA agreement.
Given that one of the reasons why Zimbabwe won the bid to host the IATFCO headquarters is its meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions (MICE) infrastructure. The development is likely to see the demand for conferencing, lodging, travel, hospitality, restaurants, transport, and ancillary services increasing with continuous flow of trade delegations, meetings, investor visits.
The construction of the IATFCO headquarters in Zimbabwe is set to add to the country’s existing stock of MICE infrastructure as the institution is likely to include exhibition facilities as is the case with the HAATC building, which the Afreximbank is currently constructing in Harare. The fact that Government pledged land for the building and possible expansion can see the IATFCO building its own conferencing and exhibition facilities as, at some stage in future, Zimbabwe will host the continental business showcase.
Local businesses that supply hotel, catering, event services, interpretation, security, logistics, office maintenance will also benefit from hosting the IATFCO.
Increased MICE tourism, foreign visitors, and IATFCO-related events are expected to increase tourism revenue. Business events venue and accommodation owners stand to benefit from expected increased revenue.
Hosting the IATFCO headquarters means that, to meet the trade body’s expectations and standards, there will be need for Government and related stakeholders to invest in improvement of transport, air connectivity, roads, utilities like electricity and the internet, conference facilities. This would not only serve the IATF, but also benefit the country’s citizens and local businesses more broadly.
While the IATFCO may employ staff from across the continent, locals will also benefit both as temporary and permanent staff. Although the construction of the HAATC, which commenced during the last quarter of 2022 and has run for over two years, is being handled by an Indian company, Shapoorji Pallonji Group as the main contractor, most local companies have been benefitting from the project as subcontracted suppliers and service providers. Some ordinary Zimbabweans have benefitted as general workers at the construction site. Zimbabweans will benefit from the construction of the IATFCO headquarters in a similar manner.
Having in its backyard a continental trade promotion event such as the IATF and the international institution running it are likely to create opportunities in the areas of trade policy, international trade, logistics, and event management among other benefits.
Zimbabwean enterprises will likely get better access to pan-African networks, markets, buyers, and investors. This could assist exporters to scale, diversify exports and get exposure to new markets across Africa. Because the IATF is one of the facilitation arms of the AfCFTA agreement, there is potential to tap into the larger single African market of some 1.4 billion people and significant gross domestic product (GDP) of over US$3.5 trillion. Increased visibility and easier matchmaking could lead to increased foreign direct investment (FDI) in Zimbabwe.
Hosting the IATFCO in Zimbabwe could encourage development of value chains in economic sectors such as agro-processing, manufacturing and logistics among others to serve intra-African demand.
The challenges
The benefits of hosting the IATFCO headquarters are not automatic. There are risks and challenges that Government and other stakeholders will need to manage well for Zimbabwe to fully realise the potential. There is need for stakeholders to roll up their sleeves and put in some work if Zimbabwe is not going to be a mere provider of land to the IATFCO and a spectator the entity’s business.
These include addressing basic infrastructure such as roads, power supply, internet, transport. Thankfully, President Mnangagwa and his Government are already seized with these issues as part of their efforts to turn Zimbabwe’s economy around and improve the people’s lives in line with Vision 2030. Maybe what needs to be done is to speed up the various ongoing infrastructural projects.
This also entails expediting the refurbishment of the country’s railway system in preparation to move millions of tonnes of goods to other countries under the AfCFTA agreement. The Ministry of Transport and Infrastructural Development should not only work flat out on ensuring that the national airline, Air Zimbabwe, operates on a sound footing, but also make sure that the country also has its own cargo airline – like Affretair of old – in preparation for Zimbabwe to benefit maximally from both the IATFCO and the AfCFTA trade pact.
Having the IATFCO headquarters in Zimbabwe’s backyard compels local economic players like manufacturers, agricultural sector and others to make the most of the entity. Sadly, in May last year industrialists revealed only about 33 percent of Zimbabwe’s large firms, 38 percent of medium-sized companies and 33 percent of small entities were ready to face all forms of external competition arising from the AfCFTA pact.
This calls for all stakeholders such as industrial bodies, and relevant line ministries to sit down, come up with strategies to ramp up production capacity and preparedness so that by the time that the construction of the building is complete, all relevant economic players in Zimbabwe will be able to take full advantage of both the IATFCO and the AfCFTA agreement to grow the country’s economy.
Zimbabwe’s level of preparedness should match the regional trade hub status which both the HAATC and the planned IATFCO headquarters are going to bestow on the country. The Office of the President and Cabinet needs to come up with a team of experts to plan around how this can be achieved.
