Dr Vera Songwe who is the The Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa , has said that the African Continental Free Trade Area has the potential to increase Africa’s Gross Domestic Product by $1 trillion.
She made the remarks at the ECA’s Regional Business Forum, which was themed, “Empowering women youths to drive Africa’s transformation agenda,”
“AfCFTA stands to grow Africa’s GDP by an additional one trillion dollars to deliver on what is needed by first unlocking our borders then building value chains and making sure the African women all work together to create the supply chain for textile, fashion, for agro-industry.” She added
Mrs Zainab Ahmed, Nigeria’s Minister of Finance who also spoke at the occasion and highlighted that it had become critical for society to empower young and women.
Africa, in particular, the West African region, has the population dynamics working for it. The African population is estimated at 1.3 billion in 2020 of which over 250 million are the youth and it is estimated that 10 million to 12 million are entering the workforce every year but only 3.1 million of them find jobs.
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