Afreximbank Issues USD29m Guarantee to Expand EAC Customs Bond

September 23, 2026 in Business, Trade & Industry by Editor

Afreximbank’s USD29 million guarantee is set to support the expansion of the EAC Customs Bond, reducing paperwork and easing the movement of goods across East Africa

 

The African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) has issued a USD29 million guarantee to support the expansion of the East African Community (EAC) Customs Bond, a digital customs guarantee system intended to ease the movement of goods across the region.

The guarantee, issued to BSMART Technology Ltd, is designed to strengthen the financial capacity behind the EAC Customs Bond and support its wider implementation and uptake among businesses and customs stakeholders.

The initiative is part of efforts to reduce the administrative burden associated with moving goods across multiple EAC member states, where traders and clearing agents have traditionally had to deal with customs documentation and guarantees at successive border points.

Under the digital bond system, eligible clearing and forwarding agents, guarantors and customs authorities can access and process customs guarantees through a common digital platform.

The system is intended to reduce reliance on physical bond documentation and eliminate the need for documents to be physically posted at individual border crossings as goods enter and leave countries along a transit route.

For businesses moving cargo through several EAC markets, the shift could reduce paperwork and the time associated with processing customs guarantees, although its effectiveness will depend on the extent to which customs authorities, financial institutions and traders across the region adopt and consistently use the system.

Afreximbank said the guarantee builds on its collaboration with the EAC Secretariat, which began with a pilot of the Customs Bond in Uganda in August 2025.

Rwanda and Burundi were subsequently brought into the system in January 2026, before the EAC Customs Bond was officially launched at the 25th EAC Heads of State Summit in March.

The facility is being supported through Afreximbank’s African Collaborative Transit Guarantee Scheme (AACTGS), which is intended to develop regional customs guarantee and digital solutions to facilitate intra-African trade.

Kanayo Awani, Afreximbank’s Executive Vice President for Intra-African Trade and Export Development, said the facility was aimed at addressing some of the practical barriers that continue to affect cross-border trade.

“With the EAC Customs Bond, we are supporting the digitisation and simplification of access to customs guarantees for businesses moving goods across the region – cutting costs and improving the efficiency of customs procedures,” Awani said.

BSMART Technology Managing Director Stephen Teang said the facility would support the company’s expansion of the EAC Customs Bond.

The EAC Customs Bond forms part of a broader push within East Africa to integrate customs procedures and reduce friction along regional transport corridors.

The region’s dependence on road transport for much of its intra-regional trade means delays at border posts can have wider consequences for transport costs, inventory management and delivery times.

Digitising customs guarantees addresses one part of that process, but the practical gains will depend on interoperability between national customs systems and consistent procedures at border crossings.

The EAC initiative also fits into the wider continental drive to remove administrative barriers to trade under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).

Afreximbank said strengthening the financial and digital infrastructure supporting customs guarantees should help expand the capacity of the EAC Customs Bond while supporting greater digitisation of customs processes.

The bank’s involvement also reflects its broader role in developing trade-finance and payment infrastructure intended to support greater movement of goods and services between African markets.