In 2000, the countries of West Africa expressed their desire to speed up the process of monetary integration initiated in the early 1980s, crystallized in a project for the two-phased creation of a single currency in West Africa. Under this plan, in its first phase, a single currency called ECO was to be launched by Member States of the West African Monetary Zone (WAMZ) in January 2015.
In the second phase, WAMZ was to merge with West African Monetary Union (WAMU) to create a single currency in all fifteen ECOWAS Member States in 2020. After three postponements in 2003, 2005 and 2009, West African authorities finally in July 2014 gave up launching ECO in January 2015, due to insufficient preparation and economic convergence among Member States of WAMZ.
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