Research/academic paper

An Empirical Evaluation of Trade Potential in the Economic Community of West African States

“Specifically, it is the aim of this study to: Determine the period within which integration effects were first felt or noticed. Estimate trade potentials among ECOWAS member nations. Test for the gaps between potential and actual trade among member nations. Proffer suggestions to guide policy making on the basis of the major findings of the study. The paper is organized as follows: This first section is introductory. Section II examines
some pertinent issues on integration in the West African subregion and provides a general
framework for the study. Section III is a review of related studies, while Section IV
elaborates on the methodology of investigating the effects of regional integration efforts.The gravity model and the data used are presented in this section as well. Section V presents the empirical results and Section VI concludes the report.”