12Enabling Future Value
Logistics & Trade
Connecting Markets. Enabling Commerce.
Efficient logistics and well-functioning corridors are what let goods, services, capital and investment cross borders, reach markets and lower the cost of doing business.
This Platform designs, finances, governs and optimises the trade and logistics systems that make regional integration real.
Platform
12 of 14
Enabling Future Value — Connecting markets, shaping the rules and building the resilience on which the next decade depends.
Practice engine
FIT
Purpose
Trade is the lifeblood of economic growth.
Efficient logistics systems and well-functioning trade corridors enable goods, services, capital and investment to move across borders, connect producers to markets, reduce the cost of doing business and strengthen regional competitiveness.
The Logistics & Trade Advisory Platform exists to help clients design, finance, govern and optimise trade and logistics ecosystems that support sustainable economic development and regional integration.
Why this matters
Africa is entering a new era of regional commerce.
The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), regional economic communities, expanding transport corridors, digital trade platforms and growing intra-African investment are transforming how businesses operate.
Yet many enterprises continue to face significant challenges arising from:
Governments are investing heavily in transport infrastructure, ports, dry ports, logistics hubs and customs modernisation. Private sector investment is expanding into warehousing, distribution, freight, e-commerce fulfilment and regional supply chains.
- Inefficient logistics systems
- High transport costs
- Border delays
- Fragmented regulatory frameworks
- Weak supply chain governance
- Customs inefficiencies
- Limited trade finance
- Infrastructure constraints
- Cross-border compliance requirements
What we do
The Logistics & Trade Advisory Platform delivers integrated advisory across the complete trade and logistics ecosystem.
Trade Strategy & Market Access
- Trade strategy
- Market entry
- Regional expansion
- Export readiness
- Import optimisation
- Investment facilitation
- Trade competitiveness
- Cross-border business strategy
AfCFTA & Regional Integration
- AfCFTA implementation
- Rules of origin
- Regional market access
- Cross-border investment
- Regional value chains
- Trade facilitation
- Regional regulatory harmonisation
- Trade policy implementation
Customs & Border Management
- Customs compliance
- Customs valuation
- Tariff classification
- Rules of origin
- Customs investigations
- Customs disputes
- Border management
- Trade documentation
Supply Chain Governance
- Supply chain strategy
- Procurement governance
- Distribution networks
- Warehousing
- Inventory management
- Third-party logistics
- Supply chain resilience
- Business continuity
Transport & Logistics
- Road transport
- Rail logistics
- Inland waterways
- Ports
- Airports
- Freight forwarding
- Multimodal transport
- Logistics infrastructure
Trade Finance
- Letters of credit
- Documentary collections
- Trade guarantees
- Supply chain finance
- Export finance
- Import finance
- Commodity finance
- Structured trade finance
International Commercial Contracts
- International sale of goods
- Distribution agreements
- Agency agreements
- Logistics contracts
- Shipping arrangements
- Freight agreements
- Warehousing contracts
- Cross-border commercial arrangements
Trade Regulation & Compliance
- Import and export controls
- Trade sanctions
- Product standards
- Competition considerations
- Consumer protection
- Regulatory compliance
- Strategic trade controls
- Government approvals
Digital Trade & Logistics Technology
- Digital trade platforms
- Electronic trade documentation
- Supply chain technology
- Logistics automation
- Smart ports
- Blockchain-enabled trade
- AI in logistics
- Digital customs systems
Signature solutions
Defined pieces of work that address the needs this platform meets most often. Each can be scoped and commissioned on its own.
AfCFTA Readiness Programme
What an enterprise or a government must have in place to trade under the AfCFTA and capture its preferences: rules of origin, tariff schedules, standards and conformity, market entry structuring and the regulatory approvals in each destination market — assessed, sequenced and executed.
Trade Corridor Development Advisory
For governments, development partners and investors: the planning, governance, financing and implementation architecture of a regional transport or trade corridor — including the cross-border instruments, EAC and COMESA obligations and institutional arrangements that make a corridor operate as one system rather than several.
Customs & Border Compliance Programme
Customs compliance strengthened, border delays reduced and regulatory risk managed — classification, valuation, origin, transit and bonded regimes reviewed, with the procedures and training to keep the position stable.
How we deliver
- Define the client's strategic commercial objectives
- Assess trade, logistics and regulatory environments
- Identify constraints, opportunities and market access requirements
- Design the legal, commercial and operational framework
- Support implementation and stakeholder coordination
- Strengthen governance, compliance and operational resilience
- Monitor performance and support continuous optimisation
Representative mandates
- Advising governments on AfCFTA implementation and regional trade policy
- Supporting exporters entering regional and international markets
- Structuring logistics arrangements for major infrastructure and mining projects
- Advising financiers on trade finance transactions
- Supporting customs compliance and dispute resolution
- Developing governance frameworks for ports, logistics hubs and transport corridors
- Advising manufacturers on regional supply chain optimisation
- Supporting investment in logistics infrastructure and distribution networks
Illustrative. Client names and commercial details are withheld where confidentiality obligations apply.
Why Ligomarc
Trade is not simply about moving goods across borders. It is about connecting markets, strengthening regional value chains, enabling investment and supporting economic transformation.
Ligomarc combines expertise in trade, finance, infrastructure, manufacturing, technology, tax, customs, disputes and public policy to provide integrated strategic advisory across the entire logistics and trade ecosystem.
Our multidisciplinary approach enables clients to expand confidently into regional and international markets, optimise supply chains, strengthen governance and unlock new commercial opportunities.
Through this Strategic Advisory Platform, Ligomarc helps Enterprises, Governments, Financiers and Infrastructure Players build, finance, govern, transform and protect institutions, investments and enterprises that contribute to Africa's long-term prosperity.
Institutional Experience Applied. Trade and logistics mandates turn on administrative decisions — classification, valuation, seizure, detention, licence suspension — taken quickly and often without full reasons. Our constitutional office experience is directly applicable to challenging and defending them on grounds of legality and procedural fairness. Our stewardship experience applies where supply chains, assets or cargo must be kept moving while the underlying dispute is resolved.
Platform leadership
Regional & continental frameworks
The AfCFTA Agreement and its Protocols on Trade in Goods, Trade in Services and Rules of Origin, and the Guided Trade Initiative; the EAC Customs Union Protocol, Common External Tariff and Common Market Protocol; the COMESA Free Trade Area and Simplified Trade Regime; the Tripartite Free Trade Area; the Northern and Central Corridor transit and transport agreements; the WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement; the Pan-African Payment and Settlement System.
Contribution to the African Purposes
Directly advances African Continental Integration — this is the platform where integration becomes a commercial reality rather than a communiqué. Supports African Family Businesses by bringing small and mid-sized African traders into formal preferential trade. Advances African Institutional Stewardship through customs modernisation and trade facilitation reform. Honours African Culture & Heritage through origin protection for African goods.
Selected experience
All experience →National oil company
Reported
Cross-border litigation strategy in a neighbouring jurisdiction
A dispute affecting a national oil company was being litigated across a border, raising the practical question of whether any outcome obtained would be enforceable where the assets actually sat.
- Disputes
- Cross-Border
- Oil & Gas
Who we serve with this
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