Africa’s central bank governors plan single monetary union

The Association of African Central Bank Governors (AACB) is contemplating the possibility of establishing a single monetary union for the continent akin to that of the European Union.

The new team has been mandated to organise the next Association confab’s symposium around the possibility of a single monetary union for the continent, taking into cognizance the experience of the European Union under the theme:“Prospects for monetary integration in Africa: Lessons learned from the experience of monetary and financial integration of Europe.”
 
This plan is one of the key points contained in the communique issued at the weekend, at the end of the Association’s meeting, which Nigeria hosted in Abuja, last week. The conference, particularly examined the state of implementation of the African Monetary Cooperation Programme (AMCP) and observed with concern the inability of African states to sustainably meet some of the criteria for macroeconomic convergence because of the negative impact of the international environment including the fall in prices of raw materials and commodities. 

Accordingly, they called on countries to strengthen efforts at implementing structural reforms, in order to diversify their economies, improve the business environment and promote intra-regional trade, in order to strengthen their resilience in the face of external shocks 

The Governors also reviewed the implementation of the work programme of the Community of African Banking Supervisors (CABS), pointing out that the program has helped to set up an intranet platform to facilitate exchange of information between banking supervisors across Africa. 

And to support the actions of the CABS, a project for collecting information on the activities of cross-border banks, will be implemented in the coming months, which will allow for the identification of risks associated with the activities.The association elected the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor, Mr. Godwin Emefiele as its President between now and 2017.