Africa-Caribbean trade ambitions face a trust test as businesses push for stronger commercial ties, investment and institutions
Keypoints:
- Trust emerges as critical trade infrastructure
- Africa-Caribbean commerce remains below potential
- Finance push is moving corridor towards deals
TRUST is emerging as a critical test of efforts to transform the historic relationship between Africa and the Caribbean into an emerging commercial corridor capable of generating substantially greater trade, investment and economic value.
The issue took centre stage at the first official episode of CORRIDOR PERSPECTIVES – LIVE on August 28, organised by the African Caribbean Sustainability & Investment Initiative CIC (ACSII), where participants argued that stronger Africa-Caribbean commerce will depend on more than finance, shipping routes and government agreements.
Trust beyond diplomatic goodwill
According to a post-webinar report provided to Africa Briefing, 27 people attended the session, a 50 percent increase from the 18 participants who joined the programme’s pilot.
But the significance of the discussion lay less in the attendance figures than in the question confronting participants: how can two regions connected by history, culture and political solidarity develop the trust required to conduct substantially more business with one another?
David F Roberts, founder and chairman of ACSII CIC, said trust had to become a practical foundation of efforts to build an Africa-Caribbean trade and investment corridor rather than remain an abstract expression of goodwill.
‘Without trust, trade relationships struggle to develop. Without trusted relationships, investment becomes more difficult,’ Roberts said.
He added: ‘Without confidence in one another, even significant commercial opportunities can remain unrealised.’
The discussion identified confidence in counterparties, regulatory systems, contractual commitments, payment mechanisms, logistics, information and market intelligence as essential components of a credible commercial corridor.
That proposition matters because political enthusiasm for closer Africa-Caribbean relations is already running well ahead of the commercial numbers.
Research released by the International Trade Centre and Afreximbank in 2024 put bilateral trade in goods at about $729m and estimated that trade between Africa and the Caribbean could reach $1.8bn annually by 2028 if value addition, trade facilitation and improved logistics are prioritised.
The research also highlighted just how limited those commercial links remain. ITC data showed Africa and the Caribbean exported less than three percent to each other, while the share of bilateral exports had not exceeded six percent over the preceding decade.
Money is beginning to move
The financial architecture underpinning closer Africa-Caribbean economic relations is nevertheless becoming more substantial.
Afreximbank said in March 2026 that it had increased its CARICOM financing limit from $3bn to $5bn, building on more than $750m already disbursed across the region and a pipeline exceeding $2bn in transactions under execution.
That commitment is significant because access to capital has long been one of the practical hurdles facing businesses seeking to establish relationships in unfamiliar markets.
The previous AfriCaribbean Trade and Investment Forum in Grenada in 2025 also concluded with more than $300m in investment and trade deals. Eight major agreements and memoranda were announced across areas including infrastructure, tourism, digital transformation and trade finance.
Those numbers suggest the relationship is beginning to acquire financial substance.
Yet money alone does not resolve one of the emerging corridor’s more fundamental challenges: businesses need confidence in the people, companies and institutions with which they are dealing.
Roberts said trust had to extend far beyond simply being willing to enter a business relationship.
‘It involves confidence in the integrity of business partners, the quality and reliability of products and services, contractual commitments, payment systems, regulation, logistics and the information on which commercial decisions are made,’ he said.
For ACSII, the ultimate objective is to create commercial relationships that deliver fair and mutually beneficial value to participants on both sides of the Atlantic.
Confidence becomes economic capital
Participants in CORRIDOR PERSPECTIVES – LIVE also explored a more difficult dimension of the trust debate — the psychological legacy of slavery, colonialism, racial inequality and economic marginalisation.
The discussion considered how long-standing assumptions about economic capability can influence perceptions of African and Caribbean businesses, including the confidence entrepreneurs place in themselves and in enterprises operating elsewhere in the Global South.
Roberts argued that these perceptions can have contemporary economic consequences.
‘This is not simply a historical issue,’ he said. ‘It can influence confidence, ambition, commercial relationships and perceptions of value today.’
The challenge, he said, was to build a corridor based on partnership rather than dependency.
The commercial implications are immediate. Long-standing perceptions of capability and value can influence where entrepreneurs seek finance, expertise, suppliers and business partners.
Businesses in Africa or the Caribbean that instinctively look elsewhere for expertise, capital or commercial validation may overlook capable partners across the Atlantic.
Equally, companies unfamiliar with each other’s standards and commercial environments may perceive cross-Atlantic transactions as riskier than deals with established partners elsewhere.
Closing that gap will require better information, stronger professional networks and commercial relationships that can be tested through actual transactions.
Garvey’s economic argument returns
The webinar drew on the philosophy of Jamaican-born Pan-Africanist Marcus Garvey, particularly his emphasis on self-knowledge, economic advancement and confidence among African-descended peoples.
The relevance to today’s Africa-Caribbean economic relationship lies less in historical symbolism than in Garvey’s insistence that economic empowerment required ownership, enterprise and stronger commercial connections among Africans and the diaspora.
Roberts linked that thinking directly to ACSII’s ambitions.
‘Economic empowerment begins with confidence in our own capacity to create, own, trade, invest and prosper,’ he said.
That principle is increasingly being matched by institution-building.
Afreximbank officially opened its CARICOM office in Barbados in August 2023 to support the implementation of its partnership with CARICOM member states and expand Africa-Caribbean trade and investment relations.
The bank has since deepened its involvement across the region as part of a wider effort to turn historic and political ties into commercial relationships.
Education as corridor infrastructure
One of the strongest conclusions from the August 28 discussion was that education should be treated as part of the emerging corridor’s long-term economic infrastructure.
Participants argued that young Africans and Caribbean people need not only conventional qualifications but greater exposure to entrepreneurship, financial literacy, international trade, technology, negotiation and the business cultures of markets across both regions.
For Roberts, that process needs to begin well before people enter the world of business.
‘Education has a central role in building the foundation for trust, and that process starts in our schools,’ he said.
Greater knowledge of African and Caribbean history, entrepreneurship, international commerce, financial literacy and technology could, ACSII argues, help produce a generation more confident about doing business across the corridor.
A company in Ghana, Kenya or Nigeria may have little understanding of potential partners in Barbados, Jamaica or Trinidad and Tobago — and the reverse is equally possible.
Better market intelligence, business exchanges and professional networks can reduce that distance.
Physical connectivity remains another obstacle. Governments and institutions have repeatedly called for stronger direct air and maritime links between Africa and the Caribbean, alongside payment systems capable of reducing friction in cross-border transactions.
From conversation to commerce
For ACSII, the goal is ultimately to move the Africa-Caribbean relationship beyond shared history and diplomatic goodwill towards measurable economic outcomes.
Roberts described the intended progression simply:
‘Trust leads to relationships, relationships lead to trade, trade creates investment opportunities, and investment must ultimately create value and prosperity.’
That is also where efforts to build the corridor face their most important test.
Conferences, webinars and diplomatic summits can create contacts and sharpen ideas, but the relationship will only become economically significant when businesses begin converting those contacts into repeat transactions.
CORRIDOR PERSPECTIVES – LIVE is scheduled to continue with Episode II on September 4 at 16:00 BST, bringing together perspectives from Africa, the Caribbean and the diaspora.
Roberts said the purpose of the initiative went beyond maintaining a conversation.
‘The objective is not simply to talk about the corridor,’ he said. ‘It is to build it.’
If an Africa-Caribbean trade and investment corridor is to become commercially meaningful, that ambition will eventually have to appear in measurable form: contracts signed, invoices paid, goods delivered, companies financed, investments completed and partnerships sustained.
History may have connected Africa and the Caribbean.
Commerce will determine how much that connection is ultimately worth.