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Despite immense strides made in recent years in Africa’s energy access – including huge leaps in renewable energy supply – around 600m Africans are still living without power.
Akinwumi Adesina, President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), argues that the energy deficit, which leaves half of Africans without reliable supply, continues to have a serious impact on Africa’s development agenda.
“No economy can grow, industrialise or be competitive in the dark,” he says.
Now, the African Development Bank, in partnership with the World Bank Group and supported by the Global Energy Alliance for People and Planet (GEAPP), Sustainable Energy for All (SEforALL), and The Rockefeller Foundation, is aiming to provide at least 300m people in Africa with access to electricity by 2030 for what has been dubbed “Mission 300”.
Mission 300 will involve energy access investments in grid and off-grid solutions by the World Bank and AfDB in virtually all the countries in Africa.
The AfDB and World Bank have also committed to powering broader human capital and growth, by expanding electricity access for productive uses in agriculture, hospitals and schools and the commercial and industrial sectors.
By aligning resources, expertise, and advocacy efforts, the partners aim to build and sustain momentum for a paradigm shift in Africa’s energy availability.
To ensure buy-in and ownership of the ambition at the highest country level, AfDB and the World Bank have also agreed to jointly convene a Heads-of-State Energy Summit in January 2025. At the summit, Heads-of-State will endorse an Africa Energy Compact in which they commit to relevant reforms while crowding additional financial resources to the energy access goal.
Twelve countries will be approached ahead of the Summit to develop Country Energy Compacts particular to their national context. The proposed Energy Compact countries are Burkina Faso, Chad, Cote D’Ivoire, DRC, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritania, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Tanzania, and Zambia.
A fast deploying technical assistance facility, overseen by the Rockefeller Foundation and GEAPP has been set up to accelerate the pace and efficiency of the identified electricity access projects.
The scale of the challenge
Yet the partners are not underestimating the scale of the resources required. Africa needs a lot more financing than what development banks alone can supply. Private and public sector investment and philanthropic capital will be crucial to meeting Mission 300’s objectives and scaling up investments in transmission, distribution, and cross-border energy trade.
As the initiative rolls out, the partners will need to bring together widespread support through concessional public financing, donor and philanthropic capital, and private-sector investments. The consortium is also advocating for robust replenishment of the International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank’s concessional arm for low-income countries, and the African Development Fund, the concessional window of the AfDB, which are key funding vehicles for low-income countries.
Robust replenishments of IDA and ADF, which sovereign governments support, could include $120bn in commitments for the Final Pledging and Replenishment Meeting, as called for in April by African countries eligible for IDA assistance, and a $25bn ADF replenishment in 2025.
Private sector role
World Bank President Ajay Banga stressed the need for a broad coalition: “We need action from governments, financing from multilateral development banks, and investment from the private sector.
A joint leadership group on Mission 300 was also created to help drive accountability across stakeholders, monitor progress, and ensure that resources are aligned to deliver results. The group is co-chaired by the CEO of SEforALL, Damilola Ogunbiyi alongside the World Bank and African Development Bank executives.
“Ensuring that everyone everywhere has access to energy is not just a matter of convenience; it is a cornerstone of human dignity, equality, and opportunity,” Ogunbiyi said.