Economic Integration, Trade Facilitation and Agricultural Exports Performance in ECOWAS Sub-Region

To reduce prices, increase specialization and improve efficiency, income and welfare — including competitiveness in world markets (International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development — ICTSD, 2011) — regional economic integration (through such things as free trade areas and customs unions) aims to facilitate international trade by reducing transaction costs such as tariff and non-tariff barriers (Dalimov, 2009; Cissokho et al., 2013). The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) was founded in 1975 for this purpose, among others. ECOWAS’ global exports and imports increased during 1999–2009 (Figure 2.1). Statistics also has it that about 20% of its food are imported (ECOWAS Commission, 2010a). With respect to its intra-regional trade (exports and imports),it can be inferred from Figure 2.2 that intraregional imports are quite higher than intra-regional exports with respective maximum values of 20% and 15% between 1999 and 2009. Some ECOWAS countries did less than 1% of their trade with other ECOWAS members (ECOWAS Commission, 2010b).