Lagos: Dr. Akinwumi Adesina has assured that his dedication to mobilizing global capital for Africa’s development will persist beyond his presidency of the African Development Bank (AfDB), which concludes on September 1, 2025. In a keynote address titled “Tilting Global Capital for Unlocking Investment Opportunities in Africa” at the Standard Chartered Africa Summit held on July 31, Adesina emphasized his continued focus on Africa’s progress, stating, “Together, let us tilt global capital to unlock Africa’s assets. 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.”
According to African Press Organization, the Standard Chartered Africa Summit, themed “Africa to the Globe: Innovation, Resilience, and Growth,” gathered prominent figures including Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, Nigeria’s Minister of Trade and Investment, Dr. Jumoke Oduwole, Hakeem Belo-Osagie, Chairman of FSDH Group and Senior Lecturer at Harvard Business School, and award-winning author, Chimamanda Adichie. The event emphasized the importance of global partnerships in unlocking Africa’s economic potential.
Since 2015, the AfDB has facilitated over $102 billion in low-cost financing to Africa. The bank’s capital has surged from $93 billion in 2015 to a projected $318 billion in 2024, marking the highest in its sixty-year history. The bank has also been at the forefront of initiatives like the rechanneling of the International Monetary Fund’s Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) to multilateral development banks, a move expected to leverage the rechanneled SDRs by 4-8 times.
The Africa Investment Forum, launched by the AfDB in collaboration with strategic partners, has generated over $225 billion in investment interest across various sectors since 2018. Additionally, the bank issued the largest social bond by a multilateral development bank, amounting to $14 billion in the past eight years, and $10 billion of long-term global benchmark bonds in 2025 to finance projects across Africa.
In a groundbreaking move, the AfDB executed the first-ever synthetic securitization of a non-sovereign portfolio by a multilateral development bank, transferring mezzanine risk from a $1 billion portfolio of private sector loans. The bank also completed its first private sector hybrid capital transaction, valued at $750 million, attracting over 275 investors with a book order of $5.1 billion, marking the largest ever book order achieved by the AfDB.
The AfDB’s initiatives have included 16 partial credit and partial risk guarantees valued at nearly $3 billion, mobilizing $5 billion for the continent. A notable $250 million partial credit guarantee facilitated the issuance of Egypt’s first Panda Bond on the Chinese capital market, valued at $500 million.
Adesina commended Standard Chartered Bank for its successful collaboration with the AfDB, particularly highlighting a partial credit guarantee for Côte d’Ivoire in 2023, which won the Sovereign Syndicated Loan Deal of the Year at the 2025 Bonds, Loans, and ESG Capital Markets Africa Awards in Cape Town. The bank also participated as the sole lender in Côte d’Ivoire’s sustainable loan partial credit guarantee transaction, unlocking £533 million to support the country’s financing needs.
Adesina urged global financial institutions to form strategic partnerships with the AfDB and other multilateral development banks to boost capital flows to Africa. He advocated for increased use of risk mitigation and credit enhancement instruments, the implementation of best practices in Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG), and enhanced collaboration to scale up local currency financing solutions.
The AfDB’s current active portfolio in Nigeria, valued at $5.1 billion, is its largest, comprising 52 operations equally distributed between the public and private sectors. The bank plans to establish a Youth Entrepreneurship Investment Bank in Nigeria, as part of a pan-African initiative to create and finance entrepreneurship opportunities for young Africans.
Furthermore, the bank is advancing Phase 1 of its Special Agro-Industrial Processing Zones across eight states, including the Federal Capital Territory, with construction underway in Kaduna, Cross River, Oyo, and Ogun. Phase 2, covering the remaining 28 states, is slated to commence in September 2025.