IOTA partners with top global institutions to create the African version of the "Digital Trade Highway": A $70 billion new market is about to explode.

Original Title: IOTA collaborates on the ADAPT project: Building the future of digital trade in Africa

Original author: Deep Tide TechFlow

Source of the original text:

Reprint: Daisy, Mars Finance

Africa is standing at the critical point of a trade transformation, which is expected to reshape its economic future. IOTA is collaborating with several leading international organizations to promote the digital flow of goods, data, and payments across the African continent, unlocking hundreds of billions of dollars in new trade value and fostering inclusive economic development.

The initiative called ADAPT (African Continental Free Trade Area Digital Access and Trade Public Infrastructure Initiative) integrates seamless payments, secure data access, and digital identity into a unified digital public infrastructure, enabling African countries to conduct trade with higher security, transparency, and efficiency.

After full implementation, ADAPT is expected to achieve the following goals:

By 2035, connect all African countries and conduct trade on a unified open digital infrastructure;

By 2035, double intra-African trade, releasing over $70 billion in annual additional trade.

Generate an economic benefit of $23.6 billion annually through faster and lower-cost trade;

Reduce the border customs clearance time from a maximum of 14 days to within 3 days.

Reduce cross-border payment fees from 6% - 9% to below 3%.

To understand how ADAPT achieves these impacts, it is first necessary to examine why the African trade system needs a digital foundation and how this initiative can unlock that potential.

Unlocking the trade potential of Africa

Africa has a population of 1.5 billion and a total GDP exceeding 3 trillion dollars, making it the largest free trade zone in the world. However, despite its large scale, intra-African trade only accounts for 17% of total trade, far below the levels of over 60% seen in regions like Asia and Europe.

Africa's trade potential is constrained by structural inefficiencies. The lack of a reliable digital identity or secure data exchange mechanisms has led to information silos. Paper documentation slows down logistics, resulting in extended border clearance times by several hours. Cross-border payments can take weeks and incur costs of up to 9%, leading to an annual loss of about $25 billion from the African economy. Additionally, a $81 billion trade finance gap restricts capital access for small and medium-sized enterprises.

These obstacles lead to inefficiencies in the supply chain, delays, and a lack of trust, while digital public infrastructure is expected to completely eliminate these issues. ADAPT provides the platform to achieve this goal, and IOTA is honored to be its founding partner.

Under the leadership of the Secretariat of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), IOTA, the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change, and the World Economic Forum jointly promote ADAPT, aiming to make African trade a global benchmark for digital innovation.

Sir Tony Blair, founder and executive chairman of the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change, stated:

This research institute is honored to collaborate with the AfCFTA Secretariat, the IOTA Foundation, and numerous public and private sector partners to design and implement this new ADAPT platform. We will provide practical support through teams spread across 17 African countries and continuously introduce top global technology and financial resources to ensure that the African single digital market is rooted in Africa and reaches the world.

The digital core of ADAPT

ADAPT primarily supports the AfCFTA in achieving its goals through three interconnected infrastructure layers: identity, data, and finance. It will create:

Trusted Digital Identity: Enterprises and governments will obtain secure, autonomous digital identities through decentralized identifiers and verifiable credentials, integrated with national identity systems such as Kenya's eCitizen and Nigeria's NIMC.

Cross-border data exchange: ADAPT will establish a unified and trustworthy source for trade documents and logistics information, relying on smart contracts, AI-driven compliance checks, and IoT-based cargo tracking, reducing border clearance time by more than half.

Interoperable Financial Layer: By connecting mobile currencies, banks, USDT and other stablecoins as well as digital currencies to a unified network, ADAPT will reduce clearance time and transaction costs.

These layers collectively release billions of dollars in trade financing for small and medium-sized enterprises, enhance security and transparency, and ensure the synchronized and efficient flow of trusted information and goods.

As Chido Munyati, Head of the Africa region at the World Economic Forum, said:

ADAPT is a major milestone in our efforts to promote free trade and economic development in Africa. Trade inefficiency remains one of the key barriers to business growth, and the digitization of trade processes will fundamentally change the way African economies connect and collaborate.

Engine: Open Source Digital Public Infrastructure

The technical vision of ADAPT is to utilize a series of emerging technologies, including the public blockchain network of IOTA, to achieve interoperability between existing national systems, industry platforms, and digital services.

As a founding partner, IOTA will contribute technical expertise and provide support to build and integrate ADAPT on the IOTA network. This technology transforms each batch of goods, each document, and each transaction into verifiable digital data, enabling seamless cross-border flow and revolutionizing trade.

With its experience in developing TLIP and TWIN solutions in Kenya, IOTA is uniquely positioned to become a strategic partner of the ADAPT program.

By building a unified digital public infrastructure based on blockchain, Africa will establish a single trusted source for seamless cross-border business:

Every link in the supply chain, from import and export certificates, invoices to all other trade documents, is fully digitized, certified, and tamper-proof;

Goods in transit can be cleared at the border more efficiently, significantly improving efficiency and reducing delays and costs;

The tokenization of physical goods, critical minerals, and other assets will provide African companies with higher quality, lower-cost trade financing solutions.

Using stablecoins such as USDT and other digital currencies for payment methods will enable faster and lower-cost cross-border trade and financing settlements.

This technology allows each participant to obtain the same trusted data, enhancing the coordination, accountability, and confidence of the entire trade process.

This technology has been successfully validated in public institutions and private enterprises in Kenya, Rwanda, the UK, and the Netherlands.

Implementing promotion

The promotion of ADAPT will be carried out in three phases:

2025–2026: Pilot programs in three countries including Kenya and Ghana;

Starting from 2026: Expand to more member countries, establish legal, technical, and governance frameworks;

2027–2035: Comprehensive promotion to all African countries.

At each stage, investors, innovators, and development partners are invited to strengthen collaboration and jointly solidify the foundation of Africa's digital trade economy. ADAPT has actively connected and welcomes other partners (such as Visa) to participate.

For more information, please contact [email protected].

IOTA's Commitment to Africa's Digital Future

Although ADAPT is the flagship collaborative project, it is only part of IOTA's broader commitment to the digital transformation in Africa. Over the next four years, we will:

Recruiting over 40 experts in Africa to strengthen IOTA and partner organizations;

Build and expand decentralized infrastructure, develop local digital trade capabilities;

Cultivate a new generation of African innovators through special events, hackathons, and university collaborations;

Launch a trade financing solution specifically designed for the African market;

Expand digital payment and stablecoin applications to support broader, fast, low-cost cross-border settlements.

Through these initiatives, IOTA aims to serve as the underlying infrastructure to help Africa transition to a digital and sustainable economic growth.

Dominik Schiener, co-founder and chairman of the IOTA Foundation, stated:

The successful application of distributed ledger technology in pilot projects in Kenya and Rwanda clearly demonstrates that Africa is ready to embrace these changes. The African continent sets a benchmark for the world by providing millions of businesses with new financing opportunities, unlocking tremendous economic potential, and creating a fairer trading competitive environment.

By providing a decentralized backbone for trade data, IOTA's technology supports the construction of a unified market based on trust, security, and openness.

Want to know more? Welcome to follow the AMA event on November 19th (Tuesday) at 23:00 Beijing time, where Dominik Schiener and several guests will attend to share more details. Interested users can ask questions in advance or on-site through the X platform.

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