As Africa moves to the centre of a multipolar new geopolitical order, connectivity becomes the defining factor for translating strategic position into economic prosperity. Agenda 2063 and the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) cannot succeed without efficient movement of goods, people and services across a continent spanning more than 30 million square kilometres.
Yet our transport systems remain fragmented. Intra-African trade hovers at between 15% and 18% of total volumes while Europe and Asia achieve 60% and 50%, respectively.
We have infrastructure in pieces, but the integration to connect them remains elusive.
Given Africa’s vast geography, maritime transport offers the most practical way forward.
We have 38 coastal nations and over 52,000 kilometres of navigable inland waterways, yet we lack a common framework for short-sea shipping. Containers moving between West African ports still route through Europe or Asia, adding weeks and significant costs to journeys that should take days.
Air transport depends on successful implementation of the Single African Air Transport Market. Continental carriers including Ethiopian Airlines, EgyptAir, South African Airways, Royal Air Maroc and Kenya Airways must lead this open-skies initiative, but liberalisation requires regulatory harmonisation across aviation authorities that have historically operated in isolation.
Road transport remains the backbone of intra-African commerce, carrying an estimated 80% of regional cargo. Priority investment in border crossing infrastructure is essential.
When I visited the Akanu-Noepe Joint Border Post at the Ghana-Togo frontier last year, under a mission of the Ghana Country Programme Oversight Committee of TradeMark Africa (TMA CPOC-GH), the infrastructure was rather new but indeed inadequate, underutilised and already beginning to fall into disrepair – highlighting the gap between policy aspiration and operational reality.
All of this hardware only functions when complemented by soft infrastructure. Governance reforms, regulatory harmonisation, capacity building and systematic elimination of non-tariff barriers matter just as much as the physical investments. These determine whether roads, ports and airports generate commerce or delays.
From our advocacy perspective at Borderless Alliance, we have witnessed repeatedly how excellent port facilities in Africa connect to road networks plagued by multiple checkpoints, how modern border posts operate under outdated procedures, and how billions in infrastructure investment underperform because of fragmented regulations.
As the AfCFTA’s Guided Trade Initiative expands from pilot phase to continental implementation, transport connectivity will determine which countries and corridors capture the benefits. The infrastructure plans are ambitious, but the governance systems needed to activate them still lag behind.
I look forward to hearing from readers: what practical steps can accelerate the soft infrastructure investments in Africa that would unlock our hard infrastructure potential?
Ziad Hamoui
The writer is the Ghana national chairman of the regional trade advocacy group Borderless Alliance. He will be a guest speaker at the 2026 Africa Prosperity Dialogues (APD 2026). This is an edited version of an article first published on the author’s LinkedIn page
Africa needs data, new markets and internal collaboration – Ziad Hamoui
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