The diversification of international markets and the direction towards regions which were neglected and evaded as risky could be a powerful factor in the search for growth acceleration and overcoming recession. The paper aims at summarizing the potential of trade with one such region – Sub-Saharan Africa, by providing an EU comparison of Bulgarian and Romanian trade relations with it. The studies the dynamics of both countries trade with the region for the 2003-2020 period, the place of Sub-Saharan Africa in Bulgarian and Romanian extra-EU trade, the commodity structure and the direction of trade.