本文是一篇國際貿易論文研究，貿易協定和區域一體化背后的動機在于可能使成員國受益的福利。西非經共體成立后，于2013年在其他地區采用了共同的外部關稅同盟，以實現經濟一體化。TEC的采用使多哥的關稅稅率降低，從而降低了增加出口需求的貿易成本。這項研究的主要目的是查明西非經共體的成立是否導致了多哥的貿易創造。除此之外，主要目的是要明確多哥是否更有可能與其西非經共體伙伴進行貿易，而不是與外界進行貿易。為了達到這些目標，描述性證據和回歸系列被應用。

CHAPTER 1  INTRODUCTION

1.1  Background of the study and problem statement
Regional and bilateral trade agreements have proliferated around the world in the last thirty years. The World Trade Organization (WTO) had notified 575 regional trade agreements (RTAs) in 2013, of  which  379  were  in  force.  Among  the  RTAs,  90%  are  free  trade  areas  (FTAs)  and  10%  are customs unions (CUs).  Most of the world trade are between the countries associated with these agreements. This global acceleration of trade agreements activity has sparked a discussion between economists  concerning  the  benefits  to  conclude  such  agreements.  According  to  Clarete  et  al. (2003), in 2000 about 97% of international trade involved countries having joined at least one of the RTAs. However, this share was 72% in 1990. Beside EU, the most famous are EFTA, NAFTA, MERCOSUR, ASEAN and its ASEAN, AFTA, EAC, COMESA and ECOWAS.
Regional agreements are concluded by countries  from the same region engaged  in  a process of regional  integration.  Beside  RTAs,  Africa  also  keeps  external  trade  relations  on  the  basis  of bilateral and multilateral agreements. The African continent includes some fifty countries, most of them  small.  This  is  why  intra-African  trade  remains  weak.  The  markets  accessible  to  African companies are indeed narrow and often compartmentalized because of the lack of communication channels and the presence of customs barriers. The importance of regionalism is motivated by its ability  to  promote  trade  and  economic  development  through  specialization  and  comparative advantage,  to  foster  institution  building  and  legal  harmonization  that  increases  the  return  on investment;  it’s also motivated by the improvement  of  its  members  welfare  that  depend on the direction of the trade flows after the integration. However the geographic proximity of countries associated  with  similarities  in  cultural  and  historical  characteristics,  has  generated  growing enthusiasm  for  Regional  Trade  Agreements.  Free  Trade  Agreements  (FTAs)  have  become  the important ways of trade liberalism as narrower pacts appear easy to negotiate, not only do they take  less  time  but  they  can  also  response  to the  necessity  of  both  parties.  According  to  Daniel (2008:  86),  regional  integration  and  cooperation  improve  countries'  economic  growth  and investment condition by providing better market access for their products and by promoting their exports growth and diversification. The obvious thing is that African countries are trying to leave of business practices inherited from the colonial era, which favor trade with their former colonies rather than between them.
.........................

1.2  Research questions
The research will focus on four critical questions:
-How ECOWAS trade agreement has affected trade performance in Togo?
- What is the role of partner states GDP in the trade flows of ECOWAS countries?
- To what extent does the distance influence trade among ECOWAS countries?
- What implications the results in the above three questions suggest for policy?
The research comprises  five chapters. Chapter1 indicates the topic  introduction, the background of study, the research questions,  the research  objectives and  the research  hypothesis. After that, chapter2 will concerns an overview on ECOWAS and Togo’ trade performance, economy features and challenge. Chapter3, demonstrates theoretical framework and review of literatures regarding the entire topic for generating the empirical models. Chapter 4, presents the methodology and data that  will  be  used  in  this  study,  the  empirical  results  and  their  comments.  Conclusion  and recommendation are defined  in chapter5. Finally, at the end, the references designating the data authenticity and the appendices are also presented.
............................

CHAPTER 2 OVERVIEW ON ECOWAS

2.1 Members and Historical background
Prior to the ECOWAS creation, the West African territory was constituted at the regional level by a group of states with different administrative and colonial systems that defined the boundaries of the fifteen states located in this zone. Today although the member countries of this community use three  different  official  languages  (English,  French  and  Portuguese),  they  have  more  than  a thousand  local  languages  and  some  of  them  cross-border.  The  desire  to  combine  political  and economic forces have been recognized as a step towards creating common prosperity in the region. For this purpose, the first desire for integration goes back to 1945 with CFA franc creation, which brought French-speaking states of the region together in a single monetary union. Then in 1964, a West African Economic Union was proposed and led to the signing of an agreement in 1965 by Guinea,  C?te  d'Ivoire,  Sierra  Leone  and  Liberia.  However,  these  initiatives  gave  no  concrete results until 1972 when the idea of regional integration was set.  Then projects were put forward and served as a basis for elaboration in 1975 of Lagos Treaty that gave birth to ECOWAS.
ECOWAS aims  to promote political and economic cooperation between  it Member States. The community  is  therefore  in  step  with  history  because  well  before  colonization,  West  African populations were among the most mobile populations in the world. In addition the migration across borders,  carried  out  by  women  in  their  commercial  activities,  makes  them  potential  factors  of integration.  The  population  of  West  Africa  has  grown  from  70  million  to  almost  300  million between 1950 and 2010. At the end of 2014, this population was almost 40% of that of sub-Saharan Africa. Considering U.S projections, the population of the region is predicted to reach from 550 to 600 million by 2050. West Africa is the world's youngest region and most densely populated region of Africa with 5% of the world's population and an area covering 40% of sub-Saharan Africa. The different socio-cultural dimensions within ECOWAS are an important factors in restoring security and peace. Building on the past, community  leaders have  made  many  sacrifices to maintain the region  political  structure.  In  1976,  Cape  Verde  (Cabo  Verde),  one  of  the  Portuguese-speaking countries in the region, joined ECOWAS and Mauritania withdrew in December 2000. ECOWAS today is a regional organization that include 15 African states such as: Cabo Verde, Benin, Mali, Ghana, Liberia, the Gambia, Burkina Faso, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, C?te d'Ivoire, Nigeria, Niger, Senegal,  Sierra  Leone  and  Togo.  These  states  have  a  common  economic  interest  and  both geopolitical and cultural ties. The western and southern boundaries of West African are formed by the Atlantic Ocean while colonial boundaries are still visible within the news boundaries between contemporary West African states. 

.............................

2.2 Economic features of ECOWAS and analysis to others trade blocs
2.2.1 The growth of African economies
The growth forecasts indicate a slowdown African Gross Domestic Product. After falling to 3.3% in 2015, the continent's real growth rate in 2016 was 1.7%, its lowest level since two decades. The economic difficulties faced by the major African economies, particularly Nigeria and South Africa, which are suffering from financial conditions and falling commodity prices, explain this slowdown. This negative dynamic is observed in all major regions of the continent, although the contraction extent in global activity is quite heterogeneous.
West  Africa,  representing  about  30%  of  Africa's population and 28% of the continent’s  GDP (measured at current prices in 2015), is the region most affected by the decline in global activity. The average growth of its real GDP fell to -0.2%, this because of the economic recession of Nigeria that is the main economy of the region. Thus, the year 2016 was marked by a fall in regional wealth estimated at USD 571.4 billion against USD 637.4 billion in 2015. Therefore, the average income per inhabitant of ECOWAS fall by nearly 13% or USD 1629 in 2016 compared with USD 1866 in 2015. However, the overall negative situation in West Africa contrasts with the countries favorable economic performance in the region.
Southern Africa, representing 17% of population and 23% of the continent's GDP, is the second region to experience a sharp slowdown in its real product.  In 2016, the growth rate was 0.7%, a sharp decline compared to the level of 2% reached in 2015. The nominal GDP was  USD 472.4 billion in 2016 against 528.2 billion in 2015. This mixed result, which has lasted for a few years, is  due  to  the  economic  difficulties  of  South  Africa,  the  main  economy  of  the  region,  which experienced a sluggish growth in 2016 (0.12%). Since  global financial crisis beginning in 2008, this country has suffered more than the others African countries. The negative impact is due to the fragility of international situation. To a lesser extent, the sluggishness of the economic situation in Southern Africa is also due to the sharp decline of Angola growth (0%), which is suffering from the commodity prices falling, mainly oil.
...............................

CHAPTER 3 LITERATURE REVIEW .............................. 19
3.1 Theorical Literature ................................ 19
3.1.1 Notion on Trade Agreement ..................................... 19
3.1.2 Trade Creation and Trade Diversion ........................... 21
CHAPTER 4 METHODOLOGY............................... 29
4.1 Theorical foundation .............................................. 29
4.2 Empirical Model Data and Analysis .................................. 30
CHAPTER FIVE CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS .......................... 43
5.1 Conclusion .............................. 43
5.2 Recommendations................................. 43

CHAPTER 4 METHODOLOGY

4.1 Theorical foundation
The gravity model The study of trade creation and trade diversion was made by using extended gravity model, based on  the  Newtonian  gravity  laws  in  physics,  the  gravity  model  used  in  equation  (1)  explain  the determinants of trade (Agbodji, 2008). Begin with Newton’s law for the gravitational force (GFij) between two objects i and j. Let us illustrate this law through the equation bellow:
In this equation, the gravitational force is proportional to the masses of objects (Mi and Mj) and indirectly proportional to the distance between them (Dij). By introducing the determinants of trade, the bilateral trade gravity model becomes:
Eijt is the exports volume from country i to country j. The gravity model does not provide details on  choosing  a  variable  to  represent  bilateral  trade,  it  can  be  the  imports,  exports or total  trade. However, Elbadawi (1995) argued that imports and exports are determined  by the same  factors (Agbodji 2008). This study uses Export volume to represent the dependent variable.
GDPi and GDPj are the real gross domestic product of countries i and j respectively. According to  the  gravity  model  theory,  economic  size  variables  have  a  positive  relationship  with  trade. Therefore, the coefficients of GDPi and GDPj should be positive that is, β1and β2 > 0.

..............................

CHAPTER 5 CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS

5.1 Conclusion
The motivation behind trade agreement and regional integration lies in the welfare that may benefit the member economies. After it creation ECOWAS adopted the common external tarrif in 2013 in other to  achieve  economic  integration.  The  adoption  of  TEC  led  to the tarrif  rate reduction  for Togo, therefore decrease the trade cost that increase export demand. 
This study had the main objective that was to find whether the formation of ECOWAS had led to trade creation in Togo. Besides, the main objective was implicitly to find whether Togo is more likely to trade with its ECOWAS partners than outside. To achieve these objectives, descriptive evidence and regression series have been applied.
Descriptive evidence has  been made using graphs while the regressions have been done and the model  corrected for the  influence of autocorrelation in the residual term. The Regressions have been done on the key variables of gravity model. Apart those key variables, control variables have been used to reinforce the obtained results. In order to determine the effect of ECOWAS on Togo's trade flows, the variable ECOWAS1 has been introduced and the results show an evidence of trade creation. That mean the bilateral trade of Togo is determined by the standard variables of gravity model. GDP of Togo impact positively trade while distance negatively affect trade. 
reference(omitted)