President of the Tunisian-African Business Council Anis Jaziri emphasised that logistics issues and exchange and financing laws are the biggest obstacles for Tunisian investors and businessmen to access the African market.
// Logistics, exchange regulations, financing…the biggest obstacles
Jaziri explained on Saturday at the opening of the regular plenary session of the Council that the absence of direct Tunisian airlines within African countries, unfortunately, disrupts the interests of Tunisians in the African market, compared to other airlines that have direct links to almost all African capitals. In contrast, Tunisair has only direct links with eight African cities. He added that this issue also does not favour health tourism, which our country should benefit from, as many Africans want to come for treatment in Tunisia, but the absence of direct lines does not encourage this.
He expressed satisfaction with the opening of a direct line by Tunisair to Douala (Cameroon) and Libreville (Gabon), the first line with Central Africa.
In the same context, he explained that the lack of a direct maritime line with West African countries is also an obstacle to exports and imports, explaining that since 2019, it has been proposed to open a direct maritime line with Dakar (Senegal), but Tunisian trade laws that do not allow the import of many African goods make this line unfeasible.
Jaziri also spoke about the issues of exchange and financing laws that still hinder the movement of Tunisian businessmen towards the African market.
The president of the Tunisian-African Business Council stressed that the African market is promising, but it is not easy, stressing that the perseverance of Tunisian businessmen has enabled them to gain a foothold. For example, the number of Tunisian companies active in Côte d’Ivoire was about 15 companies in 2014, compared to 160 companies today, and there is a big trend today towards Senegal.
// A rich outcome of 10 years of activity
Jaziri reviewed what the Tunisian-African Business Council has done in the last ten years, explaining that 40 missions were organised in Africa, and seven sessions of the International Symposium on Financing Investment and Trade in Africa (FITA) in which 15,000 participants from 82 countries took part. During these various sessions, 14,000 face-to-face meetings, 49 sessions and 63 workshops were held. In addition, 3,000 business council delegates were escorted and 130 partnership contracts were signed. All these activities covered 50 countries of the three continents (Africa, Asia and Europe).
The ordinary plenary session was the occasion to present the most important economic indicators of the past years and the Council’s action programmes for 2025, the most important of which are the Tunisian Consortium for Development in Africa (TOCAD), the Intra-African Investment Fund and the African Database, which contains the information and addresses of 25,000 African businessmen and investors that will be provided free of charge to the Council’s delegates.
TunisianMonitorOnline (Dhouha Talik – English: NejiMed)
