African Export Import Bank (Afreximbank), has called for urgent and coordinated multi stakeholder action to transform Africa’s cotton sector from a raw commodity export base into a competitive textile and garment industry. President and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Bank, Dr George Elombi, made the call while addressing delegates at the recently concluded Fourteenth World Trade Organisation Ministerial Conference in Yaounde, Cameroon.
Dr Elombi urged African governments to take bold and courageous steps to look inward for sources of development at a time when the multilateral system has been impaled by geopolitical fragmentation.
“A fair global trading system remains elusive for Africa. Governments must act boldly to protect nascent industries from unfair competition and create enabling policy environments that allow these investments to thrive,” said Dr Elombi. He underscored the urgent need to recognize that the global trading system has woefully underserved Africa and must adopt new routes to accelerate industrial transformation.
In her opening remarks to MC14, WTO Director General Dr Ngozi Okonjo Iweala described Africa as “the continent of the future, a continent of hope,” reinforcing the importance of building stronger regional value chains and production capacity.
Held in Cameroon, the first WTO Ministerial Conference in Africa since 2015 MC14 brought renewed focus to the future of global trade at a time of heightened fragmentation. At the conference, Afreximbank underscored the need for trade systems that support industrialisation and value addition in developing economies.
Building on its experience in Benin, Afreximbank is supporting the development of special economic zones dedicated to cotton processing in Cameroon, Chad and Mali, while advancing discussions in other markets including Kenya, Rwanda and Nigeria. In Nigeria alone, the Bank has committed US$2 billion to support cotton sector transformation.
Working with partners including Arise Integrated Industrial Platform (Arise IIP) and Africa Finance Corporation, Afreximbank is deploying an integrated model that combines industrial infrastructure, financing and quality assurance. The Bank is also supporting energy and transport infrastructure within industrial zones, providing working capital through its African Trade and Distribution Company and establishing African Quality Assurance Centres to ensure products meet international standards.
Dr Elombi stressed that capital alone would not deliver transformation without strong policy backing. “This transformation is not driven by financing alone, but by political will and effective public sector execution,” he added, calling for greater efficiency in administrative processes and stronger alignment between public institutions and development objectives
He said the Bank was promoting investments in special industrial zones to support the processing of commodities, with the initial investments targeting the continent’s cotton sector in Benin and Togo. Drawing on the Benin Glo-djigbe example, he demonstrated the transformative power of value addition: raw cotton that previously generated only about US$40 million export receipts can now yield up to US$800 million when processed into garments.
Through its cotton industrialisation programme, the Bank aims to create 500,000 jobs and generate US$10 billion in import substitution by 2030.
The Bank also reaffirmed its support for efforts to make the global trading system more responsive to the needs of developing economies.