African governments, partners express support for Alliance for Green Infrastructure in Africa towards goal of mobilizing $500 million | African Development Bank

On the sidelines of the Summit for a New Global Finance Pact in Paris, African leaders, investors and development partners, including the African Development Bank Group, expressed their steadfast support for the Alliance for Green Infrastructure in Africa as it moves towards a first close of $500 million for green infrastructure projects in Africa.

Akinwumi A. Adesina, President of the African Development Bank, led a roundtable discussion with other partners on the Alliance, an initiative of the African Union Commission, the African Development Bank and Africa50.

“The Alliance will mobilize $100 million in grants for project preparation, $400 million in blended finance through grants, concessional funds and commercial investment for project development,” said Adesina, explaining how the initiative will work.

At the event, Amadou Hott, the African Development Bank’s special envoy to the Alliance, announced that Mark Gallogly of the Three Cairns Group philanthropic firm had provided a $5 million grant to the Alliance.

The roundtable provided an opportunity for African presidents, investors and partners to discuss the initiative and other innovative climate finance mechanisms against the backdrop of high-level discussions to overhaul the global financial architecture to make it fairer for developing countries. These countries are also looking to access finance to quickly adapt to accelerating climate change as their budgets are constrained.

Kenyan President William Ruto said Africa’s already low share of global energy investment has fallen sharply over the past five years. The cost of borrowing in Africa, which is eight times higher than in other regions, was another challenge. “Let’s have another conversation,” Ruto said. Let’s not have a conversation about us against them, north against south. Let’s have a win-win conversation.”

Comoros President Azali Assoumani, the current chair of the African Union, said his government is creating the right conditions to attract investment in the island’s sustainable sector.

Several African leaders mentioned the use of wood as fuel and clean cooking as a particular challenge. In Madagascar, as in many African countries, we still use coal and each household has to set aside an acre to cook food, so we need funding for alternative energy sources,” said Andriy Rajoelina, the country’s president.

Ghana President Nana Akufo-Addo said the Alliance must be responsive. “The request I would like to make to the Green Infrastructure Alliance is that when projects are sent to you for your support, those projects are handled quickly,” he said.

Mafalda Duarte, executive director of the Green Climate Fund, expressed strong support for concessional financing as a tool to boost infrastructure development. “African leaders have made important decisions that are counterintuitive to many. Kenya has been investing in geothermal energy development for quite some time and concessional financing has played quite a vital role in reducing the risk of those investments,” she said. She cited Morocco’s investment in solar energy as another successful use of concessional financing.

Alexia LaTortue, United States Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for International Markets, praised the Alliance and said it could reverse the recent decline in private investment in Africa.

“I have high hopes that AGIA can help play a coordinating role between different project preparation facilities across the continent so that available financial and human resources can be deployed more efficiently and effectively,” said LaTortue.

Alain Ebobissé, President of Africa50; Jean-Michel Sama Lukonde Kyenge, Prime Minister of the Democratic Republic of the Congo; Patrick Achi, Prime Minister of Ivory Coast; President of Mauritania Mohamed Ould Ghazouani; Mark Malloch Brown, president of Open Society Foundations; and philanthropist Galoogly also spoke.

In conclusion, Adesina said the discussions had underlined AGIA’s potential to help Africa build infrastructure in a new way, “building it green and greening the already brown infrastructure to make them quite resilient.” He said AGIA would achieve this quickly and in a market-driven manner.

He said the event demonstrated the initiative’s strong political and financial support. “We need to bring this to an end now, a first closure, that’s what the future looks like, and that future will get us to COP28, or even before COP28, I hope,” Adesina said.

The 22-23 June Summit for a New Global Finance Pact brought together government leaders, financial institutions, businesses and NGOs to lay the foundations for a more responsive, fair and inclusive financial system that tackles inequality, over-indebtedness, climate change and protection. biodiversity.

Click here for more information about the Summit.

Click here for more information about the Alliance for Green Infrastructure in Africa.