The African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) is presenting its new trade facilitation programme, developed in response to the retreat of global banks from Africa's financial sector, a process also called de-banking.

Letters of credit (L/Cs), guarantees and other trade finance offerings have become increasingly hard to come by in Africa as a result of the last decade of de-banking.

Trade confirmation

Afreximbank's Trade Finance Facilitation Programme comprises a Trade Confirmation Programme and a Trade Confirmation Guarantee Programme.

Afreximbank said in a statement that the programme is being offered "in response to the increasingly stringent compliance and regulatory requirements being imposed by international banks on African banks for trade confirmation lines".

Those requirements have resulted in the international banks reducing or withdrawing trade lines to African banks and in confirming banks having risk capital and capacity constraints to support trade finance transactions.

Counterparty confidence

The Trade Facilitation Programme is structured to enhance the confidence of counterparties in the settlement of international trade transactions for intra- and extra-African trade and to improve correspondent banking relationships.

Afreximbank has already presented the programme at a launch in Egypt and on 3 October the bank embarked on a roadshow when it presented it to bankers in Senegal.

The roadshow is scheduled to visit Guinea, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Rwanda, Tanzania, Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mali and Burkina Faso.

This article represents the views of the author and not necessarily those of the ICC or Coastline Solutions.