Adesina Pledges Continued Push for Africa’s Growth Beyond AfDB Tenure
Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), has reaffirmed his unwavering commitment to Africa’s economic transformation beyond his tenure, which ends on September 1, 2025. Speaking at the Standard Chartered Africa Summit in Lagos, he emphasized that mobilizing global capital to unlock Africa’s vast investment potential will remain his lifelong mission.
Delivering a keynote address titled “Tilting Global Capital for Unlocking Investment Opportunities in Africa”, Adesina passionately declared, “As I step into a new future, you can be sure this will be my focus! For I will always have Africa in my heart and in my sight.”
The summit, themed “Africa to the Globe: Innovation, Resilience, and Growth”, convened corporate executives, policymakers, and investors. Among the notable attendees were Aliko Dangote, Africa’s richest man; Nigeria’s Minister of Trade and Investment, Dr. Jumoke Oduwole; Harvard lecturer Hakeem Belo-Osagie; and celebrated author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
Nicknamed “Africa’s Optimist in Chief,” Adesina showcased the transformative achievements under his leadership at AfDB. He highlighted the Bank’s innovative financial strategies, including optimizing its balance sheet to stretch available capital further. “Our ambition is threefold: free up capital, crowd in investors and amplify development impact,” he noted.
Some key accomplishments shared include:
- Disbursement of over $102 billion in low-cost financing to Africa since 2015.
- Tripling of the Bank’s capital base from $93 billion in 2015 to $318 billion in 2024, the highest in its history.
- Mobilizing over $225 billion in investment interest through the Africa Investment Forum since 2018.
- Issuance of $10 billion in global benchmark bonds in 2025 alone.
- The largest-ever private sector hybrid capital transaction by a multilateral bank, raising $750 million.
- Launch of synthetic securitization of a $1 billion non-sovereign portfolio.
- A $250 million partial credit guarantee enabling Egypt to raise $500 million Panda Bond on China’s capital markets.
- 16 credit guarantees mobilizing nearly $5 billion in additional funding.
Adesina also praised the fruitful partnership with Standard Chartered Bank, particularly for their role in Côte d’Ivoire’s 2023 sustainable loan transaction, which unlocked €533 million and won Sovereign Syndicated Loan Deal of the Year at the 2025 Bonds, Loans & ESG Capital Markets Africa Awards.
He urged global financial institutions to work more strategically with AfDB and similar entities to boost capital flows into Africa. He stressed the need for increased use of risk mitigation tools, ESG integration, and the expansion of local currency financing solutions.
Among future plans, Adesina highlighted the Bank’s $5.1 billion active portfolio in Nigeria, with 52 projects equally split between public and private sectors. He also announced the upcoming launch of a Youth Entrepreneurship Investment Bank and the rollout of Special Agro-Industrial Processing Zones across 36 states, with Phase 2 scheduled for September 2025.
