Regional integration

Six countries, one community

Cameroon belongs to the Central African Economic and Monetary Community (CEMAC), alongside Gabon, the Republic of the Congo, the Central African Republic, Equatorial Guinea and Chad. CEMAC organises the regional integration of its six members through shared community legal texts.

One shared central bank

The Bank of Central African States (BEAC) is the central bank common to the six CEMAC countries. It issues the CFA franc and sets the zone's policy rates. It also publishes this currency's reference rates — rates Camerpedia carries every day on the Finance hub.

Shared banking supervision

Supervision of the zone's banks and microfinance institutions is carried out by the Central African Banking Commission (COBAC), a body of the BEAC, rather than by each country on its own. A bank licensed in one CEMAC country meets the same prudential rules as its counterparts in the five other countries.

A common market and tariff

CEMAC also organises free movement of goods among its six members. It applies a common external tariff to goods coming from a non-member country, collected at each member country's borders by its own customs authority.

Where to read more

Camerpedia's explainers on trade partners and on the structure of the economy each detail, from their own angle, what this union concretely brings to Cameroon: its currency, its external tariff and the supervision of its banks.