The fifteen members of the African French zone celebrate the 40th anniversary of monetary cooperation with France on October 5 in Paris.
The celebration gave the opportunity for the Ivorian president, Alassane Ouattara, to inaugurate a conference on the monetary cooperation between France and the CFA monetary countries. The seminar has been dedicated for a purpose to stabilize the monetary cooperation between France and its fifteen member country. Monetary cooperation between France and the fifteen members of the African franc zone has stabilized the currency area even though critics do not fail to criticize the system that undermines the competitiveness of exports.
In November 1972, the first monetary cooperation agreement was signed by France and some countries in the CFA franc zone making it a total of 15 countries. The terms of agreement of the monetary cooperation between France and these countries is out to stabilize the currency exchange rate between Swiss francs and to maintain the euro rate. Secondly, French bank must, ensure unlimited convertibility of the CFA franc.
These two major rules will allow the various countries to make purchases abroad with the currency. For this to be done the fifteen member countries must file on the accounts of the French treasury half of their foreign exchange reserves. According to Demba Moussa Dembele for example, these banks blindly follow the monetary policy of the European Central Bank, the ECB, which fight against inflation, condemning their country to stagnation.
According to him, Ghana, Nigeria, attract more capital than the countries member of the franc zone. Tax economist, researcher and the director of the African Forum for Alternatives, told RFI that these criticisms did not prevent France and the fifteen members of the African franc zone to celebrate its 40th anniversary.
