On Wednesday, Omar Touray, President of the Economic Community of West African States Commission, bemoaned the poor level of trade among the member states.

“At the moment, our intra-community trade stands at 12 per cent. On the whole in Africa, our intra-continental trade is under 20 per cent which is extremely low,” Touray said on Wednesday in Abuja.

“If you look at developed countries, countries that are sufficiently integrated or regions that are sufficiently reintegrated, their intra-community trade alone is around 60 to 70 percent. So we have a long way to go,” he said

In order to increase intracommunity commerce volume, Touray suggested that the region create and export more commodities.

“This is why it is important that we open our market to our own produce, and our own manufactured items.

“To encourage industrialisation, we insist on having sufficient local content in what we produce,” he added.

Formed in 1975 to encourage economic integration among its members, the 15-nation ECOWAS bloc has had difficulty in recent years reversing an upsurge of military coups in the area, which included those in Mali in 2020 and 2021, Burkina Faso in 2022, and Niger last year.

The African Continental Free commerce Area, which aims to promote intra-African commerce and strengthen the continent’s economic position in the international market, was put in jeopardy when three countries decided to leave ECOWAS.

The nations had previously been subject to economic sanctions by ECOWAS.

But this past week, thanks to the intervention of Gen. Yakubu Gowon, the former military head of state of Nigeria, the sanctions were withdrawn.

For the sake of peace and security within the region, Touray explained, “We continue to maintain peace support missions in Member States where they are required. We have stabilisation forces in The Gambia and Guinea Bissau while another mission is at the preparatory stage for Sierra Leone.

“These preventive deployment of regional stabilisation forces are vital for the security and welfare of citizens and community market.

“In the same vein, ECOWAS is also spending considerable resources on fighting terrorism in the region while a major intervention is ongoing on maritime security.”