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By kind courtesy of Brookings, we get to take another, closer, look at the issue of trade among African states: brookings.edu/articles/intra… Here is the lowdown: 1. You would hear a lot of people talking about how low trade among African countries is and has been. 2. They will often mention a number that is anywhere from 15% to 18%. 3. They will compare the number to the supposed equivalent in Europe (anything between 65% to 68% depending on source). 4. They will lament how insidiously bad this is. 5. Then praise God that the African Union and its agencies and affiliates have medium to long-term targets for boosting intra-Africa trade share (ranging from 25% to 50%). 6. In this piece, we warn about turning this stat into some kind of fetish. 7. Because when you look closely it turns out that things get arbitrary very quickly, and it doesn't always measure what we think it is measuring. 8. Due to peculiarities of the current economic structure. 9. We end by proposing some less sexy but more meaningful metrics for gauging African integration in a way that can still command some public and political attention. 10. While acknowledging that sexy statistics are very stubborn beasts to slay.