Following decades of liberalisation, the global trade-and-investment regime is undergoing a structural recalibration. Major economies are increasingly deploying targeted protectionist measures and “economic security” controls to shield critical industries and supply chains, even as Bretton Woods institutions continue to promote openness as the optimal growth strategy.
This coexistence of competing logics, pragmatic state intervention alongside multilateral advocacy for openness, has generated policy uncertainty and pushed compliance costs higher for firms.
For Africa, these shifts carry mixed implications. On one hand, heightened competition among major economies for strategic minerals, agricultural products, and new markets creates opportunities to attract diversified investment, negotiate improved trade terms, and strengthen leverage in global forums.
BRICS’ deepening engagement, underpinned by China’s infrastructure financing and resource-linked investments, offers alternative capital and technology partnerships that could reduce dependence on traditional Western markets.
On the other hand, selective protectionism in advanced economies threatens African export growth, especially where preferential access has been critical. Stricter rules of origin, carbon border adjustments, and tougher supply-chain standards could block access to high-value markets without costly domestic upgrades. Investor caution in a costlier, less predictable global environment further risks diverting FDI toward established markets or resource enclaves, bypassing industrial and service-sector development.
In Nigeria’s agribusiness and manufacturing sectors, firms face increasingly complex and often contradictory policy demands. Exporters must comply simultaneously with AfCFTA rules of origin, certification, and customs requirements while meeting Nigeria’s local content mandates, import restrictions, and backward integration policies.
This dual compliance burden forces companies to absorb legal and advisory costs, reconfigure supply chains, and maintain parallel operational systems. For SMEs lacking compliance capacity, duplicative requirements cause shipment delays, higher working-capital needs, and deferred investments. These pressures erode competitiveness, feed into inflation, and weaken consumer purchasing power.
Africa’s Development Prospects
Amid these shifts, BRICS continues to expand its relevance, reshaping strategic options for African states. Membership growth, China’s dominance in Asia, and deepening African ties highlight alternative pathways for financing, technology, and trade.
The African Union (AU) has attempted to provide a coordinated development framework, empowering the African Union Commission (AUC) to spearhead integration. Yet progress remains uneven, slowed by fragmented policy implementation, capacity gaps, and competing national priorities. Translating frameworks like Agenda 2063 and AfCFTA into tangible outcomes requires stronger institutional alignment. External engagement – from BRICS, the EU, or the US – will only yield sustainable transformation if Africa integrates national and regional strategies into a coherent continental agenda.
Africa’s trade and investment growth will depend on its ability to:
- Leverage geopolitical competition for concessional finance and partnerships that prioritise domestic value addition.
- Deepen regional integration through AfCFTA to offset external barriers and expand intra-African investment.
- Upgrade production capacity and compliance standards to meet emerging technical, environmental, and security trade requirements.
- Support innovation hubs in countries like Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa to scale startups and entrepreneurship.
- Strengthen investment facilitation frameworks to reduce transaction costs and boost investor confidence beyond extractives.
The challenge is to convert structural recalibration into opportunity, channelling capital into value-creation industries, stimulating inclusive growth, and avoiding dependency or fragmented markets. Africa’s need to move from being a raw-material supplier to a hub of industrial goods, commanding greater economic and political influence, should progress from rhetoric to action.
Nigeria’s Strategic Position in the Emerging Trade and Investment Order
As Africa’s largest economy and most populous nation, Nigeria is uniquely placed to benefit from the shifting order. Its oil, gas, and critical minerals, coupled with political weight, should make it a premier investment destination. Yet, dependence on primary commodities and weak value-addition capacity have prevented economic transformation.
Reforms have sought to streamline processes and institutionalise cost-effective administration, but high entry and operational costs persist under a duplicative, inconsistent, and revenue-driven regulatory regime. The balancing act between economic openness and protectionist policy has raised compliance costs, dampened investment appetite, and stifled innovation.
These structural constraints have prevented Nigeria from realising its industrial potential, limiting global economic influence and geopolitical leverage. While international diplomacy continues to shape capital flows, investors now demand predictable reforms, transparency, and consistent governance, rather than distant promises of industrial greatness.
Nigeria’s admission into BRICS enhances its role as Africa’s gateway for emerging partnerships and South–South cooperation. It gives the country leverage in areas such as the energy transition, infrastructure, technology innovation, services, and agricultural transformation. Nigeria’s leadership in AfCFTA negotiations, particularly in services and investment, further strengthens its capacity to shape continental priorities.
Maximising these opportunities requires aligning Nigeria’s industrial policy, digital economy strategy, and energy transition plan with continental goals while implementing governance reforms that channel capital into productive, job-creating sectors. If effectively leveraged, Nigeria could become a continental blueprint, showing how targeted industrial policy, resource beneficiation, green branding, and facilitation reforms can catalyse intra-African trade. Anchoring supply chains in manufacturing, minerals processing, and renewable energy would reduce vulnerability to external shocks and advance AfCFTA’s goal of raising intra-African trade by 50% in the next decade.
To achieve this, Nigeria must clearly define its strategic priorities within the delicate balance of liberalisation and protectionism, ensuring openness attracts quality investment while safeguarding national interests.
