Marrakesh, Morocco – Professor Mthuli Ncube, Chief Economist and Vice-President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), has observed that Africa is one of the regions in the world with the highest visa requirements.
He has therefore cautioned that visa restrictions imply missed economic opportunities for intra-regional trade and for the local service economy such as tourism, cross-country medical services or education.
He was speaking during the African Development Bank Annual Meetings in Marrakesh, Morocco, on Friday at a high-level panel – organized jointly by the World Economic Forum and the African Development Bank – to discuss the benefits of relaxing visa restrictions throughout Africa.
In a statement issued by AfDB on Saturday Professor Ncube noted: “The movement of talent and people is at the core of regional integration and is a core pillar of the Bank’s Ten-Year Strategy. Twenty-five percent of all trade in Africa is informal; it is the strongest in West Africa. If there were no visa requirements, informal sector trading would boom.”
Dr. Ibrahim Bocar Ba, Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Commissioner of macroeconomic policy, said Africans mainly migrated to Africa.
“In ECOWAS more than 80% of all migration is intra-regional. Nonetheless, Africans need visas to go to 80% African countries, these restrictions are higher for Africans traveling within Africa than for Europeans and North Americans.”
Leonard Rugwabiza, Director, General Planning at the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning in Rwanda, shared the lessons of Rwanda, which has moved to biometric border management, low restrictions on transfer of services in engineering and legal services as well as visas on arrival for all African citizens since 1 January, 2013.
He said Rwanda, with a limited number of embassies abroad, had also introduced e-visas in order to reduce the costs and time constraints of people in obtaining visas.
He said: “Since we opened our borders, tourism from African countries has increased by 24%… trade actually shifted from being oriented to Europe and North America, and is now oriented to neighbouring countries. Trade with neighbouring countries increased by 50% last year, and trade with neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo rose by 73%”.
Abdul Awl, Board Member of Dabashill Group, said the private sector was the engine of growth, and there was talk about improving the climate for business sector.
However, visas were a major barrier, and posed restrictions on doing business, he added.
