Why

In recent years, African countries have recorded improved economic growth rates and capital flows. Yet poverty remains pervasive, and there exist huge gaps in the requirements and available resources for financing development. There are still enormous needs and many people and businesses have not yet benefited from this accelerating economic growth. African economies and companies face significant infrastructure constraints and lag behind in global competitiveness. Despite billions of dollars in development assistance to Africa over the past five decades, channelled mostly through the public sector, most African countries are poorer today than they were in the 1960s.

This situation has resulted in the re-examination of the development paradigm of the past five decades, which has focused on aid-dependent and public sector led development. The current architecture of international development financing is increasingly being challenged and the private sector is now widely recognised as the main engine of accelerated and sustained levels of economic growth, employment generation, poverty alleviation, and a key partner in closing the infrastructure gaps. Yet several factors, including capacity constraints and lack of access to early and intermediate stage project capital, inhibit the development of the African private sector. This changing development paradigm with greater emphasis on private sector development and sourcing of private capital for transforming Africa has created a demand for the skills and experience the AFC can provide.

The AFC has been established to match the challenges posed with the opportunities created by the massive funding gap for the key economic sectors of growth in Africa. Infrastructure is the salient underpinning of economic activity and is a priority for AFC. AFC is set to become the world’s leading investment bank for Africa, by driving the fast tracking of Africa’s economic development through proactively creating, acquiring and managing infrastructure, industrial and financial assets.