World trade rules: Africa needs to fight for better deals

African countries face many trade barriers. Wealthier nations subsidise their farmers, making African agricultural exports less competitive. Global trade rules promise extra support but were rarely implemented. Many African countries also lack the infrastructure, funding, or political will to build industries. This leaves them exporting raw materials instead of higher-value finished goods, missing out on greater economic gains.

The 14th World Trade Organisation (WTO) Ministerial Conference in Yaoundé, Cameroon, last week could have been an opportunity to change this. Ministerial conferences are the highest decision-making forums of the WTO. They are attended by trade ministers from countries around the world and are the venues where decisions are taken that directly impact the global economy.

However, the WTO is dysfunctional. It has not reached an agreement on major issues for more than 15 years because the interests of its powerful members often conflict with the need for a fairer regime for all. At the last ministerial conference, in 2024, the WTO again postponed decisions on areas important to the developing world.

Yet, despite the WTO’s problems, this ministerial conference presented another opportunity for African leaders to strategically push the agenda of Africa’s developing countries. This was especially important in securing more favourable trade terms for developing countries in three areas: agriculture, e-commerce, and green industrialisation.

These are some important trade areas where decisions are often postponed, leaving African countries in a precarious situation.

Securing better terms

The WTO has a set of rules known as Special and Differential Treatment, which aims to grant developing countries more favourable treatment, including technical assistance and funding to help them participate in global trade.

African countries’ development goals require a level playing field globally and the space to diversify industrialisation. Special and Differential Treatment was embedded in 157 WTO provisions.

But so far, it had failed in practice. African countries and other developing nations had not received the support promised because the special and differential treatment rules were too weak, too rigid, or not properly enforced.

For this to change, African countries needed to push for:

• Funding, technical support, and capacity-building through the Enhanced Integrated Framework, a global programme that began its third phase in March 2026.

• Concrete agreements on longstanding development concerns, such as agriculture, e-commerce, and developing green industries.

Agriculture

African countries should have focused on development-oriented reform at the WTO meeting, based on three priorities:

• Removing market entry barriers: In many developed countries, farmers are subsidised, lowering the cost of products such as cotton. This distorts the market because cotton produced by unsubsidised farmers in developing countries is more expensive. Developing countries have raised this problem at the WTO for some time, but it remains unresolved. West Africa, for example, was expected to account for about 16% of world cotton exports in 2024–2025 but could not earn as much as it could due to competition from subsidised producers in the developed world.

• Using agriculture to industrialise: Africa accounts for only about 4% of global agricultural exports, the lowest among world regions. African countries mainly export raw agricultural products (cocoa, tea, fruits) and very few finished products that command higher prices. To expand exports and build stronger industries, African countries need global trade rules that are fair, clear, and unbiased.

• Strong food security policies: Trade ministers from the Global South had to push for climate change mitigation to protect agriculture from extreme weather. Some governments purchased and stockpiled food to distribute during disasters, but this was less effective than climate mitigation and could distort trade if purchases were made at government-fixed prices.

E-commerce

Many parts of Africa still lacked reliable internet and digital infrastructure, limiting economic opportunities.

E-commerce - including online services, e-payments, and apps - earned Africa US$33 billion in 2022 and was projected to grow to US$74 billion by 2040. Expanding access to fast, affordable internet could have helped African countries use these digital services to support industrial growth, boost intra-African trade, attract investment, and encourage safe adoption of new technologies.

The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), which connected almost all African countries into a single market, promoted fair digital trade within Africa. The WTO Ministerial Conference should have ensured e-commerce rules helped Africa grow by supporting small businesses to adopt digital trading, simplifying payments, building trust in online commerce, and advancing Africa’s digital trade plans.

Africa’s green industrialisation agenda

African countries have to continue pushing for green industrialisation at the WTO. Climate-related trade measures were key.

Africa should have resisted adopting a single global carbon pricing model. Carbon pricing assigned a cost to greenhouse gas emissions, but a uniform model would have unfairly treated all countries as equal. Carbon pricing needs to be gradual, fair, and adapted to African conditions.

Africa also has to link climate and sustainability goals to practical support for green industry, such as low-interest loans and special financing to help businesses adopt cleaner technologies. African countries should have processed critical minerals like lithium, platinum, and cobalt locally rather than exporting them raw. Local processing facilities should feed regional value chains. Trade-related climate measures, technology transfer, and critical mineral supply chains are already under WTO discussion. This meeting offered African countries a chance to lobby for rules that favoured locally processed goods.

Even though no broad agriculture package was expected at this WTO meeting, African countries should have coordinated lobbying to push for trade rules that supported industrialisation on the continent and defended food security. – The Conversation

*Olabisi Akinkugbe is an Associate Professor & Purdy Crawford Chair in Business Law, Dalhousie University, and Janet Macharia is a Teaching Fellow & Coordinator, National Partnerships at the Strathmore Law School, Strathmore University.