EIF partnership helping LDCs enhance trade capacities, Annual Report reveals

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The 2021 Annual Report of the Enhanced Integrated Framework (EIF), released on 28 June, highlights how the EIF partnership between least-developed countries (LDCs), partner agencies and donors is helping beneficiary countries use trade to enhance their development prospects. The report presents more than 100 projects, pursued in 2021, where the EIF is helping LDCs improve their trade capacities in areas such as environmental sustainability and digital connectivity.

The report highlights how the EIF partnership has catalysed support for LDCs, helping them to improve their trading capacity and to generate over USD 200 million in new exports in 2021.

“LDCs took a lead role in improving their economic situation in 2021, working closely with the EIF partnership to build their institutional and productive capacities,” said EIF's Executive Director, Ratnakar Adhikari. “As a result, the EIF beneficiary countries were able to strengthen both their standing in international trade and their resilience to national and global shocks. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic and other challenges - including economic and climate-related issues - in 2021, LDC exports increased by an estimated 22 per cent, according to WTO estimates of May 2022.”

Environmental sustainability remained a priority cross-cutting area for the EIF in 2021, with EIF financing helping LDCs undertake “green transformation” projects and reduce poverty. EIF capacity-building projects delivered a wide range of environmental benefits in 2021. These included improvements across agricultural value chains, such as the honey industry in Ethiopia and the shea butter sector in West and East Africa, and the preservation of coastal areas through eco-tourism in Comoros and Liberia.

Innovative e-solutions across EIF projects in 2021 helped improve the digital skills of fintech startups in Rwanda and micro, small and medium-sized enterprises in Cambodia. EIF projects also accelerated online sales for shea butter traders in Benin and Burkina Faso, as well as for handicraft producers in Lao PDR. In addition, streamlined electronic customs systems helped to boost trade in Vanuatu and Zambia.

In 2021, an independent, external evaluation reviewed the results of the EIF programmes since the inception of the EIF. It captured the lessons learned from the first phase (covering the period 2008 to 2015) and identified priorities for mobilizing trade-related technical assistance for LDCs in the future.

The EIF received USD 7.6 million in new contributions in 2021, with USD 4.6 million provided in co-financing by governments, development partners and the private sector. In total, over 100 projects with a total value of USD 157 million were targeted at LDC priorities in 2021. This includes 40 new EIF projects approved in 2021 with a combined value of over USD 13 million.

The EIF is the only multilateral partnership dedicated exclusively to helping LDCs use trade as an engine for growth, sustainable development and poverty reduction. It is a unique global partnership between LDCs, donors and partner agencies, including the WTO, which work together to build trade capacity in LDCs.