1 Franc

The Institut d'Émission de l'Afrique Équatoriale Française et du Cameroun was established in 1945 to manage currency across French Equatorial Africa and the Cameroun mandate following the postwar reorganization of French colonial monetary institutions. Aluminium was chosen for small denominations across French overseas territories in this period largely out of necessity — wartime metal shortages had exposed the vulnerability of bronze and cupro-nickel supply chains, and the switch was never fully reversed.

The 1948 date places this coin in the earliest years of the institute's operation, before the CFA franc zone was restructured again with independence movements forcing successive institutional changes through the 1950s and into 1960.