Private sector urged to seize AfCFTA opportunities
Laone Choeunyane | Wednesday February 4, 2026 06:00
He added that these disruptions raise freight costs and squeeze the already fragile job markets across Southern Africa.
“These developments force us to confront a hard reality: Africa must rely more on itself,” Magosi said at a high-level African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) conference in Gaborone.
“No one from outside will do this for us as a continent.” Hence Botswana’s private sector has been urged to move decisively from policy awareness to commercial action under the AfCFTA, as regional leaders warn that global economic shocks are accelerating the need for Africa to trade with itself. Magosi, who heads the regional block with a combined market of over 340 million people, positioned AfCFTA as more than a trade arrangement.
He described the AfCFTA as a strategic response to uncertainty and a key pillar of SADC’s Regional Indicative Strategic Development Plan (RISDP) 2020-2030, which prioritises industrialisation, infrastructure development, market integration and resilient regional value chains.
“In these volatile times, the AfCFTA is not just a trade agreement,” he said. “It is our collective resilience strategy.”
With all SADC Member States having ratified the AfCFTA agreement, Magosi said the emphasis must now shift from ratification to implementation.
The SADC Secretariat, with support from the German Development Corporation (GIZ), is advancing this through a suite of activities.
These include institutional capacity-building, private sector awareness programmes, technical assistance, a forthcoming SADC Coordination Plan on AfCFTA Matters, and a new Consultative Forum to track progress and share implementation experiences.
However, Magosi cautioned that regional integration will fail without active business leadership.
“Governments have put frameworks in place,” he said. “But governments do not do business, the private sector does. Without private sector drive, regional integration remains a pipe dream.”
For his part, Business Botswana President, Neo Nwako, echoed this call to action.
He described the AfCFTA as “one of the most ambitious and transformative economic initiatives in Africa’s history,” offering access to a single continental market of more than 1.3 billion people.
“For Botswana, AfCFTA is not merely a trade agreement,” Nwako said. “It is a strategic economic instrument that challenges us to rethink how we produce, how we trade and how we compete across the African continent.”
He warned, however, that opportunity alone will not deliver results.
Effective participation, Nwako added, depends on supportive policies, efficient customs processes, competitive access to trade finance, strong institutional coordination and sustained public–private dialogue.
Participants from development finance institutions, exporters and policymakers reinforced this message, stressing that firms must actively understand rules of origin, tariff schedules and compliance requirements if they are to benefit from AfCFTA preferences.
Several speakers emphasised the need for Botswana’s businesses to move beyond raw exports and position themselves within regional value chains, particularly in manufacturing, agro-processing and services.
As Botswana advances its National AfCFTA Implementation Strategy, speakers agreed that success will be measured not by policy milestones, but by how many businesses, especially SMMEs and informal traders, are exporting competitively, scaling production and sustaining jobs.
As discussions concluded, participants agreed that AfCFTA’s success will be measured not by policy alignment, but by tangible increases in trade, investment and jobs.
Speakers emphasised that the groundwork has largely been laid, and that the priority now is execution, by firms ready to scale production, enter new markets and integrate into regional value chains.