Ghana’s Vice President Jane Naana Opoku-Agyemang on Wednesday urged African leaders and businesses to accelerate implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), warning that the continent risks squandering its demographic and economic potential if women, youth and small enterprises remain excluded from cross-border trade.
Opening the 2026 Africa Prosperity Dialogue (APD) in Accra, Opoku-Agyeman said Africa’s future would be shaped by its ability to move from fragmentation to integration and from dependence to self-reliance.
“A future that excludes young people, women and small enterprises is not one we can afford to sleepwalk into,” she said, speaking on behalf of President John Dramani Mahama, who was unable to attend due to international commitments.
The Africa Prosperity Dialogue, now in its fourth year, brings together political leaders, policymakers and business executives to advance practical steps for implementing AfCFTA, which is headquartered in Ghana. The agreement covers a market of about 1.3 billion people, making it the world’s largest free trade area by number of participating countries.
Opoku-Agyeman said advocacy platforms such as APD were critical in complementing AfCFTA’s institutional framework by championing intra-African trade, investment and mobility.
More Read
“The vision of Africa as a single integrated economic space remains unfinished,” she said. “Whether this reflects constraints of imagination or execution, we must remember what is at stake – prosperity for Africa’s people.”
She said Ghana’s long-standing engagement with the African diaspora, including initiatives such as the Year of Return and the Diaspora Summit, reflected a broader belief that progress was strongest when it was collective.
The vice president highlighted the central role of small and medium-sized enterprises in Africa’s economies, noting that SMEs generate more than 80 percent of employment and a significant share of gross domestic product across the continent. In Ghana, she said, SMEs had shown resilience and competitiveness despite challenging economic conditions.
Women and young people, she added, were equally critical to Africa’s growth prospects. Women account for nearly half of Africa’s workforce and dominate micro and small enterprises, while young people represent more than 60 percent of the continent’s population and are increasingly driving innovation in technology, creative industries and services.
Despite this, Opoku-Agyeman said participation in cross-border trade remained limited. Fewer than one in five SMEs engage in export activity, while women continue to face barriers related to access to finance, mobility and markets. Many young entrepreneurs, she said, still lack the capital, skills and institutional support required to scale their businesses beyond national borders.
She warned that without decisive action, African economies risk remaining locked into low-productivity models based on exporting raw materials, importing finished goods and losing skilled young people to migration.
“This trajectory is neither inevitable nor acceptable,” she said.
To convert growing political momentum into lasting economic transformation, Opoku-Agyeman called for expanded intra-African trade, effective industrial strategies, sustained investment in infrastructure and connectivity, and stronger institutions and governance.
She said Ghana was actively contributing to this agenda through initiatives such as its twenty-four-hour economy programme, aimed at boosting productivity by improving coordination across infrastructure, finance and institutions. The government’s flagship infrastructure development programme, she added, was laying foundations for trade and industrial growth while aligning national priorities with those of ECOWAS and the African Union.
More Read
Opoku-Agyeman also urged African governments to rethink borders, stressing that integration was not about erasing sovereignty but organising it to serve shared prosperity.
“It is about enabling our entrepreneurs and manufacturers to see Africa not as a fragmented abstraction, but as one connected market with vast opportunities,” she said.
She concluded by calling on participants to ensure the dialogue delivered concrete outcomes, saying the conference should be judged not by speeches alone but by what was implemented.
“Our greatest asset remains our people,” she said. “This dialogue must be remembered for what was delivered.”
