Effects of regional trade agreements on trade in strategic

Recent proliferation of regional trade agreements (RTAs) has intensified the debate on merits of south-south trade agreements. This study contributes to this debate by analyzing trade creation and trade diversion effects of African RTAs on trade in nine of the eleven strategic agricultural products. An extended gravity model is estimated using PPML. Results indicate that African RTAs have mixed effect on trade creation and trade diversion. Net trade creation is positive in four of the eight RTA and it is negative in three. Further, for a significant number of the individual agrifood commodities, regional agreements in Africa have increased openness to non-members’ trade while increasing trade among themselves. Although a lot remains to be done, RTAs in Africa are attractive means to speed up the move towards common market for agricultural products in the continent. This will have positive implication for food security and sustainable agricultural development in the continent.