The organization of West African States, ECOWAS, is moving forward to create a single currency zone for the entire region. The backing of the IMF will assure that this project will go forward. Implementing a single currency, called ECO, in this area will likely be easier than it was in Europe. Many of the francophone countries already used a unified currency, the CFA (a version of the franc). Furthermore, most currencies that had value were traded in the region anyway--there are few psychological or structural attachments to the old currencies. The disadvantage, which is pointed out to in the article, is that fiscal policies of the states must come into alignment, something which was more true for the European states when adopting the Euro (the ecu had already existed as a unit to equalize fiscal policies since the 1970s.) Moreover, I would add that it is not clear how creating a single currency could contribute to need development (especially in infrastructure.)