Emily Mburu-Ndoria, Director, Trade in Services, Investment, IPR and Digital Trade – AfCFTA Secretariat

Emily Mburu-Ndoria is a trade expert with over 20 years of work experience with international and regional organisations as well as direct national level support for countries in central, eastern, northern, southern, and western Africa. She has expertise in trade services, trade negotiations, digital trade, private sector development, trade and investment policy, trade facilitation, women and youth in trade, development of value chains, IPR, and regional integration of African countries.

As Director, Trade in Services, Investment, IPR and Digital Trade at AfCFTA Secretariat, she handles leadership and management of the directorate, providing technical and policy leadership and advisory services, facilitating the implementation of the AfCFTA agreement, ensuring the efficient functioning of all divisions, assisting state parties in implementing the protocol on trade in services, including its subsidiary instruments.

Also, she is in charge of development and implementation of the protocols on investment, IPR, and digital trade, including the activation of the relevant committees dealing with negotiation and implementation of the protocols, leads collaboration and develops good working relations and partnerships with relevant organisations on technical issues of trade and investment in Africa. Furthermore, she provides high quality factual reports and technical advisory notes to enable the smooth functioning of the committees, developing annual work-plans and budgets, performance management, staff capacity building, and implementation of activities, while ensuring the directorate’s conformity with the AU regulations and guidelines.

As former head, department of trade in service at EAC secretariat, she established and operationalised the EAC trade in services department, provided strategy and policy direction on the development of the EAC trade policy, EAC e-commerce strategy, and EAC trade in services strategy. Emily engaged development partners to support implementation of activities on trade in services, investment, e-commerce and regional integration, and assisted EAC partner states on trade negotiations, including Tripartite Free Trade Area (TFTA), African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), EAC-UK Post-Brexit Trade Arrangement, and implementation of the EAC Common Market Protocol.

Also, Mburu-Ndoria coordinated EAC Secretariat COVID-19 response which developed guidelines and protocols to support partner states in facilitating the movement of goods and services in the region.

As former principal trade advisor, European Partnership Agreement, she was the alternate team leader and trade advisor on EPA negotiations between SADC member states and the EU under the regional economic Integration support programme. Emily provided technical assistance to SADC member states on trade in services, coordinated activities related to EPA negotiations and implementation.