Abidjan: The African Development Fund, part of the African Development Bank Group, has approved a grant of $4.23 million to advance the second phase of a project aimed at integrating natural capital into development financing across Africa. This initiative will span thirteen nations, including Burundi, Cameroon, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ghana, C´te d'Ivoire, Kenya, Mozambique, Rwanda, Tanzania, Togo, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
According to African Press Organization, the project will benefit from in-kind contributions from partner institutions such as the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), the German public agency for international cooperation on sustainable development (GIZ), the African Union Development Agency-New Partnership for Africa's Development, the Economic Commission for Africa, and the United Nations Environment Programme. The project is designed to create an environment that promotes the effective utilization of natural capital and its integration into political and financial decision-making. Participating countries will also contribute to the project.
The project is set to be implemented between October 2026 and September 2029, focusing on generating outputs in policy, statistics, institutions, and knowledge. These outputs are expected to facilitate the integration of natural capital into development planning, strengthening policy-making systems, statistical systems, institutional frameworks, and knowledge-generation mechanisms for the participating regional member countries and the African Development Bank Group.
The initiative will employ an integrated approach, offering policy support, technical assistance, statistical readiness assessments, biodiversity financing tools, pilot projects for green wealth evaluation, capacity building, and peer learning. This approach is intended to foster development that is resilient to climate change, nature-friendly, and inclusive.
Innocent Onah, Chief Natural Resources Officer at the African Development Bank Group, emphasized the project's objectives, stating that it aims to enable African countries to better identify, measure, and manage their natural wealth. This will strengthen the evidence base for development financing, enhance dialogue on sovereign policies, and mobilize green investments. In the long term, the project could lead to significant improvements in GDP growth, foreign direct investment inflows, economic development, poverty reduction, employment, economic competitiveness, and financial and economic risk ratings for the target countries.