It can also reduce member countries’ dependence on traditional trading partners, increase their global competitiveness and raise their resilience against external shocks. For these reasons, LDCs participate in a number of regional integration initiatives (see Annex 7.3). Multiple membership raises various technical issues, but LDCs do not seem to be bothered about these as they are focused on maximising gains from regional trade and co-operation. For this reason, Asian regional groupings, with their overt emphasis on market access, have proved more effective than their African counterparts, where the focus has historically been on regional co-operation rather than trade. Intra-Africa trade has remained below 10 per cent (compared with about 48 per cent in developing Asia) primarily because of a lack of trade complementarity, compounded by an array of structural constraints. Political rhetoric has typically fallen short of commitment to implement tariff liberalisation schedules and to tackle non-tariff barriers.