GEG Seminar - Advancing Africa's position in World Trade: Is the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) a game changer?

Abstract

The African Continental Free Trade Area Agreement (AfCFTA) has been described as one of Africa's most exciting developments in the recent past. Touted as a socio-economic game changer for the Continent, the AfCFTA has the potential to boost intra-African trade, enhance the growth of African economies and ultimately advance Africa's position in World Trade.

However, for the anticipated benefits of the AfCFTA to materialise, a myriad of factors and variables must align. This lecture will critically explore the prospects and challenges facing the AfCFTA to ascertain its potential to advance Africa's position in World Trade positively.

This lecture will take place at the World Trade Institute in Bern and Online (via Zoom). 

To register, please email masters@wti.org 

Speaker biography

Ohio Omiunu is a Reader in International Economic Law at the University of Kent Law School. Before that, Ohio was Associate Professor/Reader in International Economic Law and Associate Head of the Law School for Research and Enterprise at De Montfort University, Leicester. Ohio received his PhD in International Economic Law from the University of Liverpool and an LLM in International Business Law from the University of Hull. Ohio is also a Barrister and Solicitor of the Supreme Court of Nigeria.

Ohio is interested in international economic law broadly conceived. Ohio engages with international economic law from an interdisciplinary perspective, dovetailing into issues of development, international relations and international political economy. Ohio has published on issues relating to the governance of the global economy, particularly the how-national actors (especially constituent units in federal systems) and non-state actors enable or resist economic integration at a regional and global level.

Ohio is an Editor of Afronomicslaw.org and the Director of the Afronomicslaw Academic Forum. This inclusive and accessible forum brings together undergraduate and graduate students and early career researchers from around the world interested in international economic law issues as they relate to Africa and the Global South. Ohio is also the co-convener of the African Paradiplomacy Network. This interdisciplinary network aims to focus scholarly attention on the nature and significance of the internationalisation of African subnational governments as a proactive response to the Continent's myriad of complex development challenges, including understanding and interrogating the competencies and capacities that underpin this practice.