Services Trade Policies across Africa : New Evidence for 54 Economies

In 2023, the global coverage of the Services Trade Policy Database, jointly developed by the World Bank and the World Trade Organization, has been significantly expanded to cover more economies, focusing in particular on the African continent. This enhancement is accompanied by expanded sector coverage including, inter alia, tourism and health care services, which are of particular interest to many African economies. The collection, processing, and vetting of regulatory data took place during 2020–22 and was supported by the German Development Agency GIZ, the European Commission and the International Trade Centre, respectively, as part of their support for the African Continental Free Trade Area negotiations. This paper presents evidence on the 2020/21 state of applied services trade policy across 54 African economies. It offers detailed comparisons of policy stances across economies, broad sectors, subsectors, and modes of supply. Services trade policies in Africa are generally relatively restrictive, albeit with substantial dispersion across economies within each sector. Professional services are the most restricted, while computer and distribution services appear as the least restricted sectors. Larger economies in terms of market size tend to be more restrictive toward services trade, whereas economies with better institutions, including higher regulatory quality, tend to be more open. At the same time, relatively high levels of restrictiveness in transportation among the more industrialized economies may curtail connectivity and thus hamper African economies’ international integration prospects. Landlocked economies also seem to miss an opportunity to alleviate pre-existing geographical disadvantages with more open transportation service policies. Overall, the wealth of quantitative information on policy restrictiveness presented in this paper, along with the underpinning regulatory information, provides a factual basis for the advancement of policy reform, regional integration, and cooperation in service sectors.