Comesa pushes for united air transport market
THE Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa) has come up with an initiative aimed at strengthening air travel and ICT connectivity in the region by implementing two projects that will stimulate economic growth.
Support to the Air Transport Sector Development
The projects — Support to the Air Transport Sector Development (SATSD) and the Enhancement of Governance and Enabling Environment in the ICT Sector (EGEE-ICT) — are both funded by the European Union through Grant Contribution Agreements each amounting €8 million.
Acting Director General, Regional Affairs Department in Seychelles Mr Christian Faure told a regional media training and familiarisation workshop in Seychelles last week that a united air transport market will aid the continent’s economic growth.
“Having a single unified air transport market gives an added impetus to the continent’s economic integration agenda in the Single African air transport market.
“At the same time, we are looking at strengthening the inter-regional connectivity of our respective capitals,” he said.
Participants at the workshop were drawn from Angola, Comoros, Djibouti, Eswatini, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Seychelles, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
He added they are hopeful that this will lead to transformative e-applications and services in Africa especially in the intra-Africa broadband infrastructure and cyber security in ICT.
SATSD is a four-year programme aimed at supporting the operationalisation of the Single African Air Transport Market (SAATM), strengthening the regulatory and institutional capacity of civil aviation institutions; and improving air navigation efficiency in the Eastern Africa, Southern Africa and the Indian Ocean (EA-SA-IO) region.
The EGEE-ICT programme aims at enhancing the governance and enabling environment in the ICT sector in the EA-SA-IO region by supporting the effective review and/or development of various regional policy and regulatory framework in a harmonised manner thus contributing to enhanced competition and improving access to cost effective and secure ICT service.
Single African Air Transport Market
Meanwhile, last year Comesa urged member states to deploy regional ICT systems such as corridor trip monitoring systems (CTMS) to enhance data and information sharing, improve regulation and progressively digitise border transactions and avoid paper-based transactions.
The two projects can reduce the infrastructure gap and accelerate regional economic development by having an improved aviation and ICT connectivity.-chronicle.c.zw
