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Trade as thebedrock ofAfrica’s economicprosperityLDC IV Conference special event ofthe UN Cluster on Trade and ProductiveCapacity on “Development of productivecapacities and trade: The key to inclusiveand sustainable growth”Istanbul, Turkey9 May 2011ECA endorses the key recommendations contained in the briefingnote prepared by the UN-CEB Inter-Agency Cluster on Trade andProductivity Capacity, to which we belong. The first point I wish tomake is that trade is playing an increasingly important role in Africa’seconomic prospects.African economies grew rapidly in the last decade and this goodperformance included African LDCs. This growth was relatively resilienceduring the global economic crises and trade was an importantsource of this growth.Also noteworthy is the fact that LDCs trade values have improvedalthough the products and destinations show limited diversification.During most of the Brussels Plan of Action decade, LDCs experiencedan average annual growth rate of exports of 14% compared to theworld average of 7.8 per cent. However, this robust performance wasmostly due fuels and mining products, which account for more thanthree-fifths of total LDCs exports. The market destinations of LDCsexports continue to evolve with China is now absorbing 21 per centof LDCs’ merchandise exports in 2008.A third point to note is that the performance of African LDCs wassimilar to LDCs as a groupIntegrating Africa121