Staff Reporter
The Southern African Development Community (SADC) has intensified efforts to accelerate the full implementation of the Electronic Certificate of Origin (e-CoO) among its Member States in a bid to modernise trade processes and deepen regional economic integration.
This comes after the bloc held a validation workshop on the impact of assessment study of the e-CoO in Lusaka, Zambia, from 11 to 12 June 2025.
The study was commissioned in line with a resolution of the Trade Negotiation Forum (TNF) during its meeting in May 2024.
In his opening remarks, SADC Senior Programme Officer for Customs, Alcides Monteiro, said the workshop was convened to fast-track the full implementation of the e-CoO system, as mandated by the Committee of Ministers of Trade (CMT) during its 31st meeting held in Windhoek, Namibia, in 2019.
"The Ministers approved the SADC e-CoO Framework and directed the Secretariat to facilitate its implementation across Member States," Monteiro said.
He also revealed that the initiative was gaining momentum at a continental level under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), which is working to develop an electronic certificate of origin platform modelled partly on the SADC experience.
“In May 2025, an AfCFTA mission visited the SADC Secretariat in Gaborone, Botswana, to benchmark the development of the continental e-CoO system as mandated by the Council of Ministers of Trade,” he added.
Guest of Honour and Zambia Revenue Authority (ZRA) Commissioner General, Dingani Banda, highlighted the importance of digital innovation in boosting trade competitiveness across the region.
“The e-CoO initiative, endorsed by SADC Ministers in 2019, is a milestone that will reduce the cost of doing business, enhance efficiency, and combat fraud in cross-border trade,” said Banda.
He commended Member States that are already piloting the system as part of broader customs reforms, including electronic data exchange and smart border technologies.
Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (ZIMRA) Commissioner of Customs, Batsirai Chadzingwa, who chaired the workshop, underscored the need to modernise trade facilitation processes to align with global digital trends such as e-commerce, e-payments, and electronic certification of origin.
“The adoption of the e-CoO system will promote investment, improve the ease of doing business and drive the implementation of the SADC Industrialisation Strategy under the Free Trade Area agenda,” said Chadzingwa.
The electronic system, officially launched in September 2022 in Blantyre, Malawi, is currently being used by Eswatini, Botswana, Mauritius, Namibia, Tanzania and Zimbabwe.
Previously, the SADC certificate of origin was processed manually since the operationalisation of the Free Trade Area in 2008.
The shift from a manual to an electronic processing platform is expected to reduce transaction costs and time, eliminate fraud through secure digital transmission, and improve access to accurate trade statistics.
The workshop served as a platform for delegates to validate the study’s findings and refine strategies to ensure all SADC Member States adopt the e-CoO system by 2026, in line with the bloc’s industrialisation agenda and broader goals of regional economic integration.
Meanwhile, an eCoO is a digitally processed and issued document by a designated authority that verifies the origin of goods for international trade.
It serves as proof that the exported goods meet the specific rules of origin requirements set by trade agreements, often entitling them to preferential treatment like reduced or zero tariffs.
