Key takeaways
- Economic scale across the markets we research differs by a factor of more than forty.
- Regional bloc membership is not stable and is currently not what many published summaries say it is.
- A shared currency does not imply shared trade rules, and leaving a trade bloc does not imply leaving a currency union.
- The continental trade agreement is real but incomplete, and completeness varies by sector.
4 minute read
The instinct to plan at continental scale survives because continental figures are easy to find. The decisions that follow are made at country level, where those figures stop being useful.
The scale gap is not a rounding difference
Among the eight markets Capital Africa has researched in full, the distance between the largest and smallest economy is not a matter of degree. A business case that works in one may be structurally impossible in another regardless of execution.
The consumer market that supports a domestic-demand strategy in one country simply is not present in the next one along.
Verified fact[1]
On World Bank figures for 2025, Kenya’s economy stands at roughly USD 136 billion and Ghana’s at roughly USD 114 billion, while The Gambia’s stands at roughly USD 2.6 billion.
Capital Africa analysis
That is a spread of more than forty to one across markets frequently discussed in the same sentence. Domestic demand is a credible basis for entry in the larger markets and rarely is in the smallest, which changes the strategy rather than the scale of it.
Bloc membership moved, and most summaries did not
The clearest current illustration is in the Sahel. Three countries left the Economic Community of West African States, and a great deal of published guidance has not caught up.
This is not a technicality. It changes the customs treatment of goods, and anyone planning a shipment on the assumption of uninterrupted bloc membership is planning on a fact that expired.
Verified fact[2]
Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger withdrew from ECOWAS with effect from 29 January 2025.
Verified fact[3]
Mali and Burkina Faso nonetheless remain members of the West African Monetary Union and continue to use the CFA franc issued by the BCEAO, which lists eight member states.
Capital Africa analysis
Currency union and trade bloc are separate institutions with separate memberships. Assuming one follows the other is the single most common factual error we encounter in material written about this region.
The continental agreement is real and incomplete at the same time
The African Continental Free Trade Area is often invoked as though it had already produced a single market. It is a substantial and advancing framework, and it is not finished, and both halves of that sentence matter to a plan.
Verified fact[4]
The AfCFTA Secretariat is headquartered in Accra, Ghana.
Verified fact[5]
Rules of origin, which determine whether goods qualify for preferential treatment, are governed by an African Union manual and remain under negotiation in some sectors, including textiles, clothing and automotive products.
Requires further review
Reported ratification counts and the completion timetable for outstanding rules of origin differ between sources. Confirm the position for your own goods and route before relying on preferential treatment.
What to do instead
Plan at the level where the decision is actually made. That means one country at a time, with the corridor it depends on, and with the bloc position confirmed as of the date you are shipping rather than as of the date someone wrote a summary.
Our country briefings are built for exactly this. Each is dated, sourced, and states what could not be established.
Capital Africa analysis
Corridors are frequently a better planning unit than countries. Landlocked markets depend entirely on a neighbour’s port, so their commercial reality is set partly by a government they do not answer to.
Verified fact[6]
Burkina Faso illustrates how concentrated a single economy can be: non-monetary gold accounted for 82.3 per cent of export earnings in 2024 on national statistics institute figures.