LIVINGSTONE, Zambia — September 9, 2026 — The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) is calling for stronger, more predictable, and increasingly agile digital regulatory frameworks as technology rapidly transforms trade, communications, and public services across the region.
Speaking at the annual meeting of regional information and communications technology regulators in Livingstone, Zambia, COMESA Assistant Secretary General Mohamed Kadah emphasized that regulatory systems must evolve alongside technological change.
The message highlights a growing challenge for African regional integration: while technology is making it easier for businesses and consumers to operate across borders, differences in national regulations can continue to create barriers within regional markets.
Digital Regulation Is Becoming an Integration Issue
For COMESA, digital policy is no longer simply a telecommunications issue. It is increasingly connected to the broader goal of building an integrated regional economy.
Digital technologies now influence how businesses communicate, consumers purchase goods and services, governments deliver public services, and companies transfer money across borders.
As those systems become more interconnected, regulatory differences among countries can make regional commerce more difficult.
A digital business operating across several COMESA member states, for example, may encounter different requirements involving telecommunications, data management, licensing, competition or digital payments.
Greater regulatory compatibility could reduce some of those obstacles while giving businesses clearer and more predictable rules for operating across multiple markets.
Keeping Regulation Ahead of Technology
COMESA’s call for more agile regulation also reflects the speed at which the digital economy is changing.
Artificial intelligence, financial technology, mobile payments, e-commerce and other emerging technologies are developing much faster than traditional regulatory systems were designed to accommodate.
That creates a difficult balancing act for African governments.
Regulators must protect consumers, promote fair competition and address security and privacy concerns while avoiding rules that unnecessarily restrict innovation or discourage investment.
Regional cooperation could become particularly important because digital technologies rarely remain confined within national borders.
A payment may originate in one country and be processed in another. A digital company may serve customers across several jurisdictions. Data and communications can cross borders almost instantaneously.
National regulations therefore increasingly have regional consequences.
Digital Payments Could Transform Regional Trade
One of the most important areas is cross-border digital payments.
African regional integration cannot reach its full potential if businesses can move goods across borders but struggle to move money efficiently between countries.
More interoperable payment systems could make it easier for small businesses, traders and consumers to conduct regional transactions without relying on complicated or expensive international payment arrangements.
For COMESA, this connects digital policy directly with its broader economic integration mission.
If telecommunications networks, payment systems and digital regulations become more compatible, businesses could potentially operate across the region with fewer administrative and technological barriers.
Small Businesses Could Be Major Beneficiaries
The consequences could be especially significant for Africa’s small and medium-sized businesses.
Traditionally, expanding into another country could require substantial physical infrastructure and investment.
The digital economy changes that calculation.
An entrepreneur can potentially advertise products online, receive digital payments and communicate with customers hundreds or thousands of kilometers away.
But that opportunity depends on the regulatory environment.
If countries establish dramatically different requirements for digital businesses, the advantages of regional integration can quickly be weakened.
More predictable regional rules could therefore help transform COMESA from a collection of neighboring national digital markets into a more connected regional digital marketplace.
The Bigger African Integration Picture
COMESA’s push also fits into the wider African Union integration agenda and the development of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).
Africa is attempting to build a larger continental market, but the future of that market will increasingly be digital.
Roads, railways, ports and border posts remain essential to African integration. However, digital infrastructure is becoming another critical form of connectivity.
The continent increasingly needs what might be described as digital corridors alongside physical trade corridors.
That means compatible telecommunications networks, efficient cross-border payment systems, predictable rules for digital businesses and greater cooperation among national regulators.
From National Regulation to Regional Solutions
The meeting in Livingstone therefore represents something larger than a discussion among ICT regulators.
It raises a fundamental question about the future of African integration:
Can African countries develop regional rules quickly enough to keep pace with technologies that already operate across national borders?
For COMESA, the answer will have significant economic consequences.
A fragmented regulatory environment risks creating new digital borders just as African governments are attempting to remove traditional trade barriers.
But greater regulatory cooperation could produce the opposite result—using technology to make regional markets more accessible, competitive and interconnected.
As Africa’s digital transformation accelerates, regional integration will increasingly depend not only on connecting countries through highways, railways and ports, but also on connecting their digital economies.
And COMESA’s message from Livingstone is clear: Africa’s regulatory systems will have to move faster if the continent’s digital integration ambitions are to keep pace with technological change.