Grace Ashiru
The Arab Coordination Group (ACG) and the African Development Bank Group (AfDB) (www.AfDB.org)Â launched a new phase of their partnership aimed at scaling co-financing, mobilising private capital, and accelerating Africa’s economic transformation.
The High-Level Consultation Meeting convened at the AfDB’s headquarters in Abidjan, established a common platform to move from fragmented cooperation toward programmatic, large-scale co-investment aligned with the continent’s economic development priorities.
The consultation takes place at a time when Africa faces a widening development financing gap and an urgent need to mobilise capital at scale for energy access, climate resilience, food security, regional integration, and private-sector-led growth.
It also reflects the collective ambition of ACG members to expand their engagement with Africa, deployed in a more coordinated and catalytic manner.
Discussions focused on how the ACG and the AfDB can jointly anchor Arab-African co-financing—bringing together their respective balance sheets, long-term and counter-cyclical financing capacities, sectoral expertise, and country platforms—to mobilise larger, more coordinated public and private investment in support of Africa’s development investment priorities. Participants explored concrete pathways to enhance joint project preparation, harmonise financing approaches, strengthen policy dialogue, leverage comparative advantages, and supporting country-led development agendas, while ensuring that investments delivered measurable impact and long-term resilience.
The consultation is also framed within the AfDB’s agenda to strengthen Africa’s financial sovereignty through a New African Financial Architecture (NAFA), aimed at better integrating development finance institutions, guarantee providers, insurers, capital markets, and private investors.
The High-Level Consultation Meeting culminated in the adoption of a Joint Declaration on a Strategic Partnership between the ACG and the AfDB . The Declaration articulates a shared political vision, and translates it into operational direction, with clear priority areas for cooperation. It also establishes principles for institutional follow-up mechanisms to guide the next phase of Arab – African partnership.
As a practical next step, the Declaration provides for the development of a Financing and Operational Partnership Framework, to be considered in 2026, which will define modalities for co-financing, pipeline coordination, mutual reliance, and regular joint programming. It also recognises the central role of the African Development Fund (ADF)—the AfDB Group’s concessional financing arm—in supporting low-income and fragile countries. The Declaration also calls for exploring closer collaboration between ACG institutions and ADF
