During the inauguration ceremony of the ECOWAS representative office in Abidjan which was held on 27 June 2016, Ivorian Prime Minister Daniel Kablan Duncan announced that a round table was to be organized, without disclosing the date set, in Abidjan for lenders to discuss fund mobilization for integration-oriented economic infrastructures projects within the ECOWAS.

The Prime Minister said projects involving “roads, railways and electricity would be implemented”. “These infrastructures are necessary to boost intra-community trade, facilitate free circulation of goods and people, and make our region is development pool which will profit our populations,” said Daniel Kablan Duncan.

It should be recalled that the Prime Minister, during another conference organized by the public-private sector and concerning infrastructures developed by Japan-Cote d’Ivoire cooperation and held on May 3 in Abidjan also, mentioned the cost of these projects. “At the sub-regional level, FCFA11 trillion ($22 billion) is needed to implement 17 major integration projects,” he then said.

Presently, exchange rate between African countries is weak. It represents only 10-12% of the continent’s foreign trade. Intra-ECOWAS’s is 12%. Meanwhile, intra-regional trade in North America and Western Europe is respectively 40% and 60%.

Trade rate of Cote d’Ivoire with Africa is of 34%, while that with ECOWAS members is 27%. However the nations projects to bring the latter to 50% by 2020.