AfCFTA Appellate body engages Permanent Court of Southern Common Market

The Appellate Body of the African Continental Free Trade Area is participating in a pioneering peer learning and capacity-building workshop with the Permanent Court of Review of the Southern Common Market (MERCOSUR), marking the first formal engagement between the AfCFTA Secretariat and the South American trading bloc’s dispute settlement system.

The workshop, taking place in Asunción, the capital of Paraguay1, represents a significant milestone in South-South cooperation on trade governance, bringing together judicial and legal experts from two of the world’s most ambitious regional integration projects to share experiences and strengthen their respective dispute resolution frameworks.

The structured exchange is designed to facilitate peer-to-peer learning between the two institutions, with discussions centered on regional integration jurisprudence, institutional procedures, and proven practices in trade dispute settlement.

The AfCFTA Appellate Body, a relatively newer institution, forms part of the dispute settlement mechanism under the African Continental Free Trade Area agreement. As the AfCFTA works to operationalise its various institutional structures, learning from more established regional trade courts offers valuable insights into effective jurisprudence and procedural frameworks.

Regional integration jurisprudence forms a core focus of the workshop discussions. MERCOSUR’s two decades of experience in adjudicating trade disputes provides a rich repository of lessons for the AfCFTA system.

The workshop reflects a growing recognition among regional trade organisations that peer learning and institutional cooperation can accelerate capacity development and help newer systems avoid pitfalls experienced by their predecessors.

For the AfCFTA, building a robust and respected dispute settlement mechanism is crucial to the success of the continental free trade area. Businesses need confidence that commercial disputes will be resolved fairly and efficiently, while member states require assurance that the rules-based system will be applied consistently and impartially.

The engagement with MERCOSUR also signals the AfCFTA Secretariat’s commitment to learning from diverse regional integration experiences. While Africa’s integration challenges differ from those of South America, the fundamental legal and institutional questions facing regional trade courts share common ground.

The workshop comes at a critical juncture for the AfCFTA as it transitions from policy development to implementation. With Secretary-General H.E. Wamkele Mene emphasising the shift toward delivery of concrete results, strengthening the institutional architecture becomes essential to facilitating trade and investment flows.

The Asunción workshop represents part of broader efforts by the AfCFTA Secretariat to build partnerships with established regional economic communities and trade organisations worldwide. Similar engagements with the European Union, the World Trade Organisation, and other regional bodies have helped inform the development of AfCFTA’s institutional framework.

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