I'll leave the Deputy Chairperson to guide us on that one.
The number 17 speaks to 17% which is the per cent that Africans make up of the global population. If you take all of humanity, we are 17% of the world.
The number 3 speaks to 3% which is what Africa's economy makes up of the world's economy.
The number 2 speaks to 2% which is what Africa's manufacturing output makes up of global manufacturing output.
The number 1 speaks to 1% which is what the continent's output of steel that is the foundation of industrialisation makes up of global steel production.
To put it differently and as dramatically, the entire manufacturing output of the African continent - all 55 countries, hon Mohai - is about equal to the manufacturing output of Italy.
Now, I raise that to show how significant the challenge is that we must deal with and why the AfCFTA - with all of its challenges and with all of its difficulties that it will no doubt have when we implement something as big as that - has always been called for by the founding mothers and fathers of African unity. When you split
yourself into 55 units you never have an economy big enough to attract massive investment. If I make this microphone system for one country, the cost of the microphone system will be sky-high. If I make the same microphone system for millions and millions of people right across the world or billions of people across the world, my unit cost of production will come down. Anyone who has run a business will know it. It's called the economies of scale.
So, at the heart of the AfCFTA is this idea that Africa must change its future; its own storyline. It's not going to come from foreign aid. It's not going to come from anybody being nice to us. It's not going to come from allies in any other part of the world, whether it's East or West or North or wherever. It's going to come from us as Africans changing our story.
However, that means sacrifices in doing things differently. As long as 55 countries all want to have control over their own decisions and make decisions that only apply to that economy, you are never going to get scale. Therefore, what we seek to unlock and what the question speaks to, is how the AfCFTA can unlock that.
In the question I have also been asked how far the process of implemnting it is. After the agreement was broadly concluded, we
asked countries to sign it and 54 out of the 55 countries signed it. The only country that has not signed it yet is Eritrea. Then we asked countries to ratify it. It had to come to Parliament, and 28 Parliaments or appropriate institutions have ratified the agreement.
Once a significant number have ratified it, it comes into legal force and effect, which it did a few months ago. In July this year, President Ramaphosa led a delegation of Ministers to a city in Niger, and in Niger we switched on the implementation phase of the AfCFTA. Recently I went to Addis Ababa in Ethiopia for the inaugural meeting of the Council of trade Ministers to look at the progress that is being made in getting the technical work done. We will be reporting to the heads of state in February next year.
Finally in December, which is in a few weeks' time, we will have a council of ministers' meeting in Ghana to get a further report on progress. [Applause.]