In recent years, the volume of goods moving across borders increased exponentially due to the global integration of modern production systems, new forms of electronic commerce, and the development of containerized transport that has allowed large cost reductions in cargo handling. Indeed, the value of international trade was 50 times higher in 1999 than it was in 1960.
However, developing countries in general and African countries in particular have not yet benefited from the steady increase in international trade. In 1950, Africa delivered a tenth of world exports, but by the year 2000, this share had declined to only 2.7 %. The situation is even worse in sub-Saharan Africa whose share of the total world export of goods and services fell from 1.9% to 1.4% in the 1990s. This dismal performance of African countries is partly due to high transaction costs, which significantly increase the cost of tradable goods and consequently determine the degree of integration of a country into the world economy.