Commodity Trade And Trade Potentials In Ecowas

Abstract

In spite of the vast deposit of resources and human endowments in ECOWAS region, gains from trade have really been marginal in the region. ECOWAS members have poor performance in export of dynamic products; they remained commodity dependent in its exports, leading to transfer of economic gains across border. Over 90% of the region’s export is primary products with very little value-added which accentuated from commodity price and demand inelasticity resulting in terms of trade losses and volatile foreign earnings. Based on these facts, the study tries to investigate the impact of export diversification and composition on GDP growth and GDP per capita respectively. This was achieved using econometric analyses involving co-integration technique and an analytical least square technique for the period of 1975-2009 and 1990-2007 respectively in 15 ECOWAS states. The study was deemed significant, as export diversification index induced a significant but inverse impact on GDP growth while manufacturing value-added exerts though weak but a positive effect on GDP per capita growth. The study found that the high skewness of ECOWAS to commodity export in the period observed would have been responsible to the result obtained, therefore, finding concluded that it is not how much that is exported that matters but very important is what is exported as regions with less specialization and more diversified exports generally experienced higher economic growth rates and contributed much more to overall exports. Several recommendations for policy and further studies were made in the study; notable among them is the need for ECOWAS countries to develop domestic processing capability and see export as originating from domestic sufficiency.