Regional Institutions

The inherent multi-country aspect of trade, and the pervasive concern to help strengthen regional stability, and therefore improve development prospects, through better regional integration, naturally leads to involving the Regional Economic Communities (RECs) in devising and implementing trade logistics and facilitation efforts across their members countries. Regional communities actually are in a unique position to facilitate implementation of trade logistics and facilitation programs across borders, while helping mitigate individual countries' concerns about costs and distribution of benefits.

Another argument in favor of their active participation lies in the fact that a number of countries depend to some extent on other countries' willingness to embark into a logistics and facilitation program to reap the benefits of their own actions, and the externalities involved in any country's program are better managed at the regional level. This is obviously the case of many landlocked developing countries. Similarly, significant economies of scale can be achieved, in implementing a customs reform program throughout a sub-region for instance, or in establishing regional training centers for country officials, which need a regional anchor to materialize.

Regional Institutions, at the policy level like Regional Economic Communities (RECs) or at the professional level like Sector Regional Organizations (SROs), are therefore key players in fostering the regional integration agenda. Sub-regional transport policies and initiatives are designed and endorsed by RECs, and implemented by member countries with the cooperation of the private sector, in particularly through SROs.

During the 2004 SSATP Annual Meetings in Addis Ababa, the Sub-Saharan RECs agreed to establish the RECs Transport Coordination Committee (TCC), its main mandate being to guide the design and monitor the implementation of the SSATP work program for Regional Integration and Transport. This work program is itself spelled out in the RECs Transport Action Plan, which is regularly updated and is the main instrument to measure progress in program implementation.

Regional Economic Communities
African Union (AU)
NEPAD
UNECA
UEMOA
ECOWAS
CEMAC/ECCAS
SADC
COMESA
EAU

Sector Regional Organizations
PMAESA
PMAWCA
FESARTA
UAR