Africa Business Council President Dr Amany Asfour has called for African governments to reserve at least forty percent of public procurement for continental businesses, arguing that preferential treatment for African firms represents an essential mechanism for translating the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement into tangible industrial development.
Speaking on the AfCFTA podcast on Thursday, February 13, 2026, Dr Asfour stated that the policy would ensure products available on African soil are purchased from African suppliers rather than imported from outside the continent. She cited Egypt’s four hundred medical consumer supply industries as an example of existing capacity being overlooked in favor of imports.
The recommendation emerged from the African Union Private Sector Forum, which the Africa Business Council leads, and has been adopted by African Union Ministers of Planning and Finance as a bold strategy to implement the AfCFTA’s trade liberalization commitments through concrete industrial outcomes.
Dr Asfour used commodity value chains to illustrate Africa’s position in global markets. The continent exports shea butter worth ninety million dollars annually while the global cosmetics industry using shea butter exceeds five hundred billion dollars, leaving African producers capturing only a fraction of the value their raw materials create.
Similarly, Africa exports cocoa beans worth five point seven billion dollars annually while the global chocolate industry exceeds two hundred and seventeen billion dollars. She argued that without processing and value addition, African countries remain trapped at the bottom of lucrative value chains.
To operationalize its strategy, the Africa Business Council has established twenty five clusters covering sectors including trade, investment, energy, agriculture, infrastructure and natural resources development. Each cluster aims to integrate private sector actors across the continent, identifying existing resources, industrial capabilities, investment opportunities, technology requirements and financing needs to produce finished products with market access.
Dr Asfour highlighted mineral resources as particularly urgent given global competition for Africa’s deposits of critical minerals needed for the energy transition. She observed that by 2030, the world will need approximately three hundred million electric vehicles, creating enormous demand for lithium batteries, questioning who will manufacture these batteries and whether Africa will capture that value.
The Africa Business Council President expressed concerns over the awareness deficit among the very people the AfCFTA aims to serve. Drawing on her experience as chair of COMESA Women in Business, she recounted visiting borders between Zambia and Zimbabwe, Egypt and Sudan, and Ethiopia and Djibouti to speak with cross-border women traders.
She revealed that when asked whether they knew about the Simplified Trade Regime of COMESA, cross-border women traders demonstrated no awareness. The same challenge applies to the AfCFTA, with these integration frameworks remaining unknown to many small-scale traders who form the backbone of intra-African commerce.
Dr Asfour suggested coordinated outreach through regional and national chambers of commerce, private sector organizations and specialized networks for women entrepreneurs, youth and specific sectors as the major approach to addressing the awareness deficit as the AfCFTA transitions into the implementation phase.
The Africa Business Council, established as an independent private sector institution of the African Union, promotes and advocates for African private sector interests while playing a primary role in fast-tracking intra-African trade and boosting AfCFTA integration.
