The French Development Agency (AFD) and the West African Development Bank (WADB) have strengthened their partnership with a view to economic recovery in West Africa after the Covid-19. It will focus on climate finance.
Countries that are not facing a new wave of the epidemic are committed to economic recovery after Covid-19. In West Africa, the French Development Agency (AFD) and the West African Development Bank (WADB) are advocating climate finance for a recovery “in order to make the alignment of WADB members with the Paris Agreement effective”.
The two financial institutions have thus just strengthened their partnership which covers areas that are essential for the economies of the member countries of the West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU), particularly energy, urban development, financial engineering, agriculture and food security. “With this new agreement WADB and AFD will be able to carry out exchanges of expertise and experts, study missions, seminars, workshops and forums between them, but also to take advantage of the IDFC (International Development Finance Club) of which they are both members and the Climate Action in Financial Institutions initiative. They will also be able to carry out joint financing of projects”, says AFD.
AFD and WADB are also planning capacity building as part of their efforts to strengthen their cooperation in view of the post-Covid-19 recovery. This involves training staff, thanks to AFD’s Development Campus, to measure the impact of projects as well as support for project ownership. “By choosing climate finance and alignment with the Paris Agreement as a thematic priority, it is resolutely in line with the spirit of Agenda 2030 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDOs) and towards a systematic questioning of the economic, social and environmental impacts of our financing”, says François Jacquier-Pelissier, AFD’s Director in Togo.
Jean Marie Takouleu
