Zenith Bank Plc has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) for the development of the SmartAfCFTA portal.
The bank said in a statement that the aim is for the growth of trade promotion within the African continent.
The bank explained that the SmartAfCFTA portal has the capacity to provide information like trade indicators, market trends, custom tariffs, trade agreements, rules of origin, market access requirements of relevant jurisdictions, export potentials, export diversification indicators and contact details of business partners in target markets and other trade-related information about Africa, adding that it will help to unlock the vast opportunities for trade on the African continent.
The MoU was signed by the GMD/CEO of Zenith Bank Plc, Dr. Ebenezer Onyeagwu and the secretary general of the AfCFTA secretariat, Mr Wamkele Mene, during the 8th Annual Edition of the Zenith Bank International Trade Seminar on Non-Oil Export held recently in Lagos.
“This collaboration aims to unlock the vast opportunities presented by AfCFTA not only for Nigeria’s economic prosperity but also for advancing trade across African countries,” Onyeagwu said.
He noted that the key role the annual Zenith Bank Trade Seminar plays in deepening the conversation on promoting non-oil export in Nigeria by bringing together non-oil export practitioners and relevant government agencies to interact and explore the opportunities and proffer solutions to the challenges of non-oil export in the country.
He also noted the outcomes of the previous editions of the annual meet, including the extension of the period of repatriation of non-oil export proceeds from 90 days to 180 days, and the policy mandating shippers not to carry export without a Nigeria Export Proceeds (NXP) Form Number, the need to incentivise exporters to repatriate their export proceeds through the official channels and the recommendation to create export terminals across various export hubs in the country were also from past seminars.
In his keynote address Mene, thanked the bank for partnering with the AfCFTA for the development of the SmartAfCFTA portal.
“Zenith Bank was the first bank to say ‘we want to partner with you. We went to see the founder and chairman, and he said that Zenith Bank wants to make a contribution to digitise trade in Africa. And so the portal was not my idea, it was not our idea at the AfCFTA Secretariat, it was Zenith Bank that stepped up and said, ‘this has to be done!’ So I want to thank you very much, GMD for this collaboration.”
Zenith Bank launched the Non-Oil Export Seminar in 2016 as an initiative to deepen the discourse on promoting the non-oil export business in Nigeria.
The 2023 edition featured a goodwill message from the secretary of the National Action Committee on AfCFTA, Mr. Olusegun Awolowo.
There were two-panel discussions, with the first panel discussion entitled ‘Nigeria non-oil export industry – growth opportunities”, while the second panel discussion was ‘Harnessing the opportunities in service export’.
