The Director of Centre for Aviation Policy & Development-Africa, Mr. Richard Kyereh has called for the full implementation of the Single Africa Air Transport Market (SAATM), noting that the mission of the AfCFTA which seeks to accelerate intra-Africa trade and strengthen Africa’s voice in the global market space will be meaningless unless this framework is in place.

For AfCFTA to indeed be a true game changer, Mr. Richard Kyereh argued that the SAATM must be considered as soon as possible since this framework bears much advantages over the current Bilateral Air Services Agreement (BASA) in terms of general integration of Africans through interconnectivity. With SAATM, he stated that intra-Africa connectivity will be much easier and African countries will now be more accessible.

“SAATM will eliminate BASA and provide a universal air service agreement which will allow African airlines to operate scheduled flights within the continent with ease. Thus, Ethiopian Airlines will be able to fly passengers from Addis Ababa to disembark in Accra and further proceed with another set of passengers from Accra to Niamey”
Mr. Richard Kyereh

According to Mr. Richard Kyereh, airlines will enjoy some tax reductions which will lower their operational cost under SAATM. He explained that, under SAATM, an open playing field will be created where there is a single regulation for the setting up of tariffs, capacity and frequencies for air carriers. Airlines will have a huge sigh of relief owing to the fact that tariffs will be subjected to the terms of a regulatory agency under SAATM rather than the whims of individual African government.

Touching on SAATM as a catalyst for Agricultural Development, Mr. Richard Kyereh posited that, with agriculture as a major tool for poverty reduction through the creation of jobs, an enhanced continental freight service will serve to motivate African farmers since post-harvest losses will be reduced, now that there is a larger market under AfCFTA. Agriculture accounts for 32% of the GDP of Africa. He added that a liberalized African airspace will provide air connectivity for the movement of agricultural raw materials particularly those that are time-bound within Africa and into the global market.

Mr. Richard Kyereh further explained that under the framework, African airlines now have access to a larger market which will increase their revenue. Under SAATM, no country will be able to exercise its discretion in choosing which airline flies into their country as has been the case by some government to give leverage to their national airlines and other non-African airlines at the expense of other competent African airlines.

He added that the coming to being of SAATM will also create jobs and an opportunity for cheaper air freight charges considering airline competition, stating that a study on benefits of full air transport liberalization between 12 African countries, conducted by the African Civil Aviation Commission and the International Airport Transport Association in 2015 indicated that complete air connectivity across these 12 countries would add US$ 1.3 billion to the countries’ GDP and create over 155,000 new jobs.

“SAATM and AfCFTA are inextricably linked in that, the former is one of the key elements that can help bring a meaningful transformation to the African Continent by way of an all-inclusive sustainable development. With this, the turning of the African Continent into a global powerhouse as put forward by the AU’s Agenda 2063 would be realized.”

About the Single African Air Transport Market (SAATM)

The Single African Air Transport Market (SAATM) is a flagship project of the African Union Agenda 2063, an initiative of the African Union to create a single unified air transport market in Africa to advance the liberalization of civil aviation in Africa and act as an impetus to the continent’s economic integration agenda. SAATM will ensure aviation plays a major role in connecting Africa, promoting its social, economic and political integration and boosting intra-Africa trade and tourism as a result.

SAATM, per the policy documents of the African Union, should have been implemented by 2017 after the decisions reached at the 24th Ordinary Session of the AU Assembly in Ethiopia in 2015. As of January 2020, only 34 countries, including Ghana, had signed a commitment to SAATM. In the absence of SAATM, bilateral services agreement is been used by countries to enhance commercial aviation and trade activities.