Senior research fellow and political economist, Lebohang Pheko speaks to 702’s John Robbie about the formation of the Tripartite Free Trade Area (TFTA) that will stretch from Cape Town to Cairo.
The TFTA is designed to boost intra-Africa trade in order to improve Africa’s global competitiveness and reduce the barriers and costs of moving goods throughout the continent.Pheko says the TFTA consolidates the African region as a trading bloc that will facilitate internal trade and compete against the European Union, Asia and the United States. She says it will provide a significant market of producers and consumers and will provide access to the burgeoning middle classes. She is of the view that the TFTA will create a pool of resources in the realms of finance, human capital, technical, intellectual and economic to the beneficiation of the continent.
