The African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) has urged Nigeria and the rest of Africa to strengthen intra-African trade and resilience to protect against geopolitical shocks.

In a recently released Trade and Development Finance Brief, titled: ‘Africa’s Trade and Investment Landscape’, which examines the structural challenges shaping Africa’s trade performance and investment outlook in an increasingly uncertain global environment, it pointed out that Africa’s trade landscape remained heavily dominated by the export of raw materials, including agricultural products, oil, gas and minerals.

The report, however, regretted that imports continued to be heavily skewed towards manufactured goods and machinery.

The report noted that the existing export-import configuration leaves many African economies overly exposed to unfavourable terms of trade shock on account of external headwinds, including commodity price volatility, geopolitical tensions and associated global supply chain disruptions.

According to the report, the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) remained central to efforts aimed at diversifying the continent’s trade base, strengthening regional value chains and increasing intra-African trade.

It further expressed that alongside the African Union’s Agenda 2063, the AfCFTA provides a practical framework for integrating fragmented markets, expanding industrial production and boosting productivity, with intra-African exports projected to increase by more than 20 per cent within a decade as implementation advances.

Also, the report further highlighted the importance of scaling investment in trade-enabling infrastructure, including energy, transport, communications networks, ports and logistics systems, to reduce the cost of doing business and improve cross-border trade flows.

It expressed that targeted infrastructure investment could support industrialisation, strengthen regional specialisation and improve Africa’s competitiveness as an investment destination.

It also pointed to a wider set of priorities for strengthening the continent’s trade and investment ecosystem, including regulatory coherence, institutional strengthening, economic diversification, improved access to finance for small and medium-sized enterprises and greater use of digital financial technologies.

Besides, the report stated that domestic and foreign investment were increasing across many African economies, notwithstanding the observed dominance of foreign investment.

It further mentioned that the direction of investment flows was uneven across sub-regions, with Eastern and Southern Africa receiving a larger share of foreign direct investment compared to Western and Central Africa.

Afreximbank said the findings reinforced the need for coordinated action to expand trade finance, improve trade-enabling infrastructure, deepen regional integration and accelerate value addition across the continent.

Managing Director, Research for AfreximBank, Dr Yemi Kale, said regional development finance institutions, including AfreximBank, were playing an increasing role in supporting intra-African trade through trade finance and related initiatives.

The federal government has issued the general guidelines for the implementation of the Tax Acts 2025, establishing a formal framework for managing the country’s transition from its repealed tax laws to a new tax regime that takes effect from January 1, 2026.

The guidelines, released by the Federal Ministry of Finance on Thursday, are addressed to taxpayers, tax practitioners, revenue authorities and other stakeholders, and cover a wide range of issues arising from the changeover — including the treatment of existing tax liabilities, ongoing audits, pending incentive applications, and transactions that straddle both the old and new legal regimes.

Speaking on the release, Finance Minister and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Mr. Taiwo Oyedele, described the document as a framework for managing transitional issues while ensuring that the new laws are not applied with retroactive effect.

“The Guidelines are anchored on three key principles — clarity, fairness and administrative certainty,” Oyedele said.

The Tax Acts 2025 comprise four statutes: the Nigeria Revenue Service (Establishment) Act, the Nigeria Tax Act, the Nigeria Tax Administration Act, and the Joint Revenue Board (Establishment) Act. Each law carries its own commencement date as enacted. The Nigeria Tax Act, 2025, in particular, takes effect from January 1, 2026.

Under the guidelines, all tax liabilities, assessments, audits, investigations, disputes and enforcement actions relating to periods before January 1, 2026, will continue to be handled under the repealed laws.

Tax returns covering accounting periods that ended before that date must also be filed under the previous legal framework, while returns due from January 1, 2026, onward will fall under the new regime.

Existing tax incentives and exemptions granted under the repealed laws will remain valid until they expire, providing continuity for businesses and investors that had secured such reliefs under the old framework.

However, new applications and pending requests will be reviewed under the provisions of the Tax Acts 2025.

The document also addresses the treatment of income taxes and transaction taxes, development levies, record-keeping obligations, and cross-regime transactions that begin under one legal order and conclude under the other.

The ministry said the guidelines are intended to ensure uniformity in implementation across all revenue administration bodies, including the Nigeria Revenue Service, State Internal Revenue Services, the FCT Internal Revenue Service, Local Government Revenue Committees, and the broader community of tax practitioners.

The minister described the Tax Acts 2025 as a significant milestone in Nigeria’s ongoing tax reform programme, saying the guidelines clarify how existing obligations, live matters and future transactions will be treated as the country moves from the old regime to the new framework.

Mobile technologies and services contributed $240 billion to Africa’s economy in 2025, equivalent to 7.8% of GDP, according to the GSMA’s Mobile Economy Africa 2026 report.

The sector also supported approximately 13 million jobs and generated $45 billion in public revenues, underlining the growing role of mobile connectivity in powering economic growth, innovation and digital transformation across the continent.

The report finds that Africa’s mobile industry is entering a new phase of development. Having spent the last decade expanding connectivity, operators are increasingly focused on unlocking the full value of digital networks for consumers, businesses and governments.

Across the continent, operators are evolving beyond their traditional role as connectivity providers to become digital transformation partners, deploying artificial intelligence (AI), expanding digital services and opening network capabilities to developers through standardised APIs. According to GSMA Intelligence research, 79% of operators in Africa identify becoming a digital transformation partner as a primary enterprise objective.

By 2030, mobile technologies and services are expected to contribute $290 billion to Africa’s economy as digital adoption deepens and connectivity continues to support productivity, innovation and economic development across the region. Today Africa’s digital challenge has shifted from expanding network coverage to ensuring people, businesses and governments can fully benefit from the connectivity already in place.

Vivek Badrinath, Director General of the GSMA, said: “Africa’s mobile industry is entering a new phase of development. Having connected millions of people and businesses over the last decade, the focus is increasingly shifting towards unlocking greater value through AI, digital services and new forms of innovation.

Realising this opportunity will require continued investment, policies that encourage innovation and a shared commitment to ensuring that everyone can benefit from the opportunities digital technologies create.

“We also call on the broader technology supply chain – including those who manufacture the components that make devices possible – to reflect on how their own success is tied to a connected world, and to join us in closing the usage gap and making that world more accessible and affordable for all.”

Across the continent, operators are increasingly deploying AI to improve network performance, strengthen customer experiences and support new digital services.

However, Africa is home to more than 30% of the world’s languages, while today’s leading AI models remain predominantly trained on English and other high-resource languages.

Through initiatives such as the GSMA’s “AI language models in Africa, by Africa, for Africa” programme, industry stakeholders are working to strengthen the data, compute, talent and policy foundations needed for African-led AI development.

The report also highlights growing momentum behind GSMA Open Gateway, which enables operators to provide standardised network APIs to developers and enterprises. These capabilities are helping unlock new digital services while supporting fraud prevention, identity verification and digital trust across sectors including financial services, e-commerce and digital government.

Policy choices will play a critical role in determining whether Africa can fully capture this next wave of digital growth. Investment incentives, spectrum availability, affordability measures and regulatory certainty will all influence the pace of innovation, digital adoption and infrastructure deployment across the continent.

Despite this progress, the report warns that Africa’s greatest digital challenge is no longer network coverage, but adoption. While mobile broadband networks now cover the vast majority of the population, approximately 63% of Africans live within coverage but are not using mobile internet. By comparison, only 9% remain outside mobile broadband coverage.

Affordability remains the single largest barrier to mobile internet adoption across much of the continent, alongside digital skills gaps and other social barriers. The report highlights the importance of initiatives aimed at improving device affordability, expanding digital skills and creating a more inclusive digital ecosystem.

To support the next phase of digital growth, the GSMA is calling for policies that encourage investment, improve affordability and accelerate digital adoption. Mobile operators across Africa are expected to invest over $76 billion in network infrastructure between 2024 and 2030.

Evidence from several African markets also demonstrates that reducing taxes on devices and digital services can help accelerate adoption and expand access to the benefits of the digital economy.

Key findings from the Mobile Economy Africa 2026 report:

• Mobile technologies and services contributed $240 billion to Africa’s economy in 2025, equivalent to 7.8% of GDP.

• Mobile’s economic contribution is forecast to reach $290 billion by 2030.

• The mobile ecosystem supported approximately 13 million jobs in 2025.

• The sector generated $45 billion in public revenues.

• Mobile operators are expected to invest over $76 billion in network infrastructure between 2024 and 2030.

• Approximately 63% of Africans live within mobile broadband coverage but are not using mobile internet, compared with a coverage gap of 9%.

• 5G adoption is expected to reach 21% of total mobile connections by 2030.