AFRICA NEWS AGENCY the world to access those basic commodities that we need for our survival, such as protective masks, antibacterial gels, pharmaceuticals, etc. So for us AfroChampions, COVID-19 has given us the opportunity to accelerate AfCFTA.
So, in concrete terms, how has the AfroChampions Initiative been able to continue its mission in 2020? And what is your overall assessment of the projects conducted last year?
We, in the specific context of 2020, have stayed true to ourselves and our convictions - economic integration and the AfCFTA. We immediately launched our “AfCFTA Zero Year Report” to look at the way African states were committed to the AfCFTA and ready for it. The report was released with an advocacy campaign, KeepAfCFTAOnTrack, including an op-ed calling for maintaining the institutional process aimed at finalizing the AfCFTA, which was signed by leading representatives of the African business community.
On the health emergency response: we reached out to the African CDC in the spring 2020 to bring the private sector and the entire African business ecosystem together to mobilize resources. We established, in partnership with Africa CDC, a Board of Trustees in which AfroChampions was represented, along with Afreximbank and other stakeholders. I am happy to say that, to date, the fund has raised close to 70 million dollars in this effort, and that we also received other in-kind contributions. And with respect to immediate response for COVID, the first thing we did was to mobilize resources to support the work of CDC, resources to access medical PPEs and medical ventilators, as well as medical pharmaceuticals. Then, we realized that the real objective is not to succeed in getting supplies from outside Africa. The real objective is to support countries as they
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« Basically, what we have done with AVRIVA is to prevent the lack of mobility from slowing down the AfCFTA. » try to build capacities - because people are losing jobs. We, therefore, have started to work with the African Cotton and Textile Industries Federation among others, in Kenya and Uganda, and with some of the leading multinationals to have a certification for us to be able to do medical PPEs and masks.
On the response to the economic challenges resulting from the pandemic, and the new context: another big challenge at that moment was movement of people, since the borders were closed. AfroChampions therefore came up with the AVRIVA program, designed with the African Union - AVRIVA standing for: Accelerated Virtual Resilient Integration for a Vibrant Africa. One of AVRIVA’s key components is the movement of people. As the borders were closed, we started thinking of a way to re-open them, a way that would be safe, without requiring countries to either force people to go through a lot of tests, or to prevent people from travelling because the certificates would not be reliable. The solution was an application. It has been designed thanks to the African private sector and thanks to African resourcefulness - especially that of young people! The result is an online platform. Its aim is to maintain a
certain level of digital vigilance in the movement of people, to the point where entry requirements can be harmonized between countries when people move.
AVRIVA first led to the development of PanaBIOS, a technological tool, developed with the support of KoldChain, a startup from Kenya, in collaboration with the African Standards Organization (ARSO), the Afreximbank, the Trade and Development Bank, Africa CDC and the African Tourism Board. We then, offered it to the Africa CDC and the African Union to make it available to member states at a low cost. I am happy to announce that a lot of organizations are now pressing countries to deploy this system. Airlines are integrating it; and many laboratories based on the continent or outside have registered. The success comes from the very pragmatic approach, because the system is fully interoperable: it helps us integrate countries’ existing platforms so that people on the continent can travel freely - while creating a shield that allows us to know what is happening on the continent. This is essential for the movement of people, especially for the revival of the tourism sector, which sometimes represents 15 to 40% of the GDP of African countries.
The other aspect of AVRIVA is the super-app that we developed with support from the AfCFTA secretariat - also known as the AfCFTA app. It is basically a platform allowing every SME or individual on the continent to have an ACFTA number, which is almost like a profile. Another feature of that app is that it can share standards. Many food and pharmaceutical companies operate in their own countries under the auspices of local food and pharmaceutical authorities, but each time they want to sell products in other countries, they have to go through a complex process. This functionality allows the food and drug standardization bodies in countries to work in an integrated way to allow for cross-border verification - again, a very pragmatic approach. This functionality
