Secretary-General of the Pan-African Manufacturers Association (PAMA), Segun Ajayi-Kadir, has given insights into how Nigerian manufacturers could benefit from the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).

Since the inter-African trading agreement commenced over five years ago, Nigerian manufacturers and traders have continued to struggle to tap into the array of opportunities in the single African market.

Experts in the manufacturing sector said that AfCFTA has a huge potential market for the estimated 1.8 billion people from the continent with a combined Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of $3.4 trillion.
Despite the agreement for the trading framework by African governments, progress has been extremely slow with less than 15 per cent in the last five years.

Ajayi-Kadri, in an interview with The Guardian, said that while the agreement provides the framework, real market access depends on compliance, strategy and operational readiness.
He pointed out that entering new markets requires more than production capacity and demands preparation, market intelligence and strategic positioning.

He said: “A structured approach significantly improves success rates, particularly in a context where AfCFTA implementation remains progressive, selective and uneven across countries and trade corridors. Although the AfCFTA framework is in force, trade under preferential terms is still being rolled out through phased instruments such as the Guided Trade Initiative (GTI), pilot corridors and country-by-country readiness assessments. As a result, market access is not yet uniform across the continent.”

Based on what is already working for early movers, he added that the pathway was practical and sequential.
First step, he said, was to secure an AfCFTA certificate of origin, the entry point.

He regretted that tariff-free trade under AfCFTA was conditional, not automatic, stressing that to qualify, products must meet Rules of Origin requirements, typically involving 35 to 40 per cent Regional Value Content (RVC) within AfCFTA member states.

“On the factory floor, this means full localisation is not required; imported inputs can be used, provided sufficient value is added locally.

“Manufacturers must maintain detailed cost records covering labour, energy, materials, and overheads and must obtain the AfCFTA Certificate of Origin from the relevant national authority,” he added.

For companies that get this right, Ajayi-Kadri said the impact was immediate.

According to him, early adopters reported savings of between 15 and 25 per cent on import duties, directly improving margins and competitiveness.

He noted that although 54 countries from the continent had signed the agreement, implementation remained uneven.
He expressed that market entry should therefore be targeted, not continental from the beginning.

“Priority markets with relatively advanced implementation, include Nigeria, South Africa, Egypt, Ghana, Kenya, Rwanda and Cameroon. These countries have more established customs systems, clearer AfCFTA procedures and active trade flows.

“Verified preferential exports have already exceeded $65 million between 2024 and mid-2025, with manufactured goods leading. A strategic approach would be to start with one or two markets, refine the compliance and logistics model, then scale regionally,” he said.

While tariffs are declining, Non-Tariff Barriers (NTBs), including delays, inspections and regulatory inconsistencies, remain the biggest obstacle and can, in practice, exceed the cost of tariffs themselves.

Common responses from successful companies include appointing dedicated trade or customs compliance officers, using digital single-window systems where available and engaging with the AfCFTA NTB reporting platform.

“Critically, compliance is not optional. Each country maintains its own requirements for product standards and certification, labelling and packaging and health, safety and Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) measures. Until harmonisation is fully achieved, manufacturers must treat standards compliance as a core business function, not a regulatory afterthought,” Ajayi-Kadri added.

Urging alignment with regional value chains not just market access, he said AfCFTA was designed to support industrialisation, not simply increase trade volumes.

The emphasis, he stressed, was on moving up the value chain, from raw materials to processed and manufactured goods.
This creates strategic positioning opportunities: companies that process locally become integral to regional industrial policy, and cross-border production partnerships can count toward local content calculations.

The cotton-textile example makes this stark. Africa produces approximately six per cent of the world’s cotton but captures less than two per cent of global textile value, a disparity that underscores the immense untapped potential for value addition within the continent.

He opined that manufacturers entering new markets should work through a structured checklist like confirmed Rules of Origin compliance, understand country-specific standards and import procedures, secure necessary certifications before shipment and choose the right entry model.

He also suggested direct exports, distributors, joint ventures or regional hubs, build efficient logistics corridors and warehousing capacity; set pricing that reflects logistics costs, foreign exchange risks and local purchasing power, among others.

He insisted that each of these elements must be in place before a manufacturer could claim to be genuinely market-ready.