Swiss ambassadors meeting in Abidjan, the commercial capital of the Ivory Coast, invited a senior management team from the African Development Bank Group to exchange views on development and cooperation.
The envoys held a working lunch, hosted by the Swiss Under-Secretary of State for Sub-Saharan Africa, Siri Walt, on Friday 20 January. Ambassador Walt is the head of the Africa Division in the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs.
African Development Bank Group Acting Chief Economist Kevin Urama, Daniel Schroth, Director of Renewables and Energy Efficiency, and Joseph Ribeiro, Deputy Director General for West Africa, were joined by Laura Rutishauser, Senior Adviser to the Executive Director for Germany , Luxembourg, Portugal and Switzerland.
The Bank team met with the Swiss ambassadors stationed in the West Africa sub-region for a lively discussion on current issues affecting Africa in general and the region in particular.
Urama, when asked if Africa’s population growth was a dividend or a challenge, was quick to reply: “Whether it is a challenge or a dividend depends on the country. The economies of Africa are currently labor intensive due to low levels of technological inputs,” he noted.
“The young population is, therefore, a great asset to boost economic productivity in key sectors. But when they are excluded from key productive sectors, they become disenfranchised and restless,” he said. He added: “Africa’s young people are enthusiastic about innovation and can drive innovations to boost productivity and growth in all countries, but when there is no capital to back their innovations, they are left orphaned and less productive. Including youth in key sectors like agriculture, energy and country governance could help countries reap their demographic dividend.”
Going further, Urama explained: “We need to think about planning… to match population growth with economic growth rates. If the population growth rate is higher than the GDP growth rate, poverty deepens.
Urama is also the Bank’s acting vice president for economic governance and knowledge management.
Ribeiro said some of the most successful African Development Bank-led projects in West Africa and across the continent were those that prioritized women and agriculture. He said the bank has allocated $178 million to build food resilience and fight malnutrition in phase 2 of the P2RS program (Program to Build Resilience to Food and Nutrition Insecurity in the Sahel).
Ribeiro said that security was one of the main important challenges. On the institutional front, the subregion is currently home to three de facto governments that came to power through a military coup: Mali, Burkina Faso and Guinea. He said the bank had resumed programs in these countries from the end of July 2022.
“If you are doing a job for the people, it is the same people who receive the help they need, beyond political events,” he explained. He stressed that the Bank takes all necessary steps to ensure effective fiduciary accountability in project implementation.
Africa is not on track to meet the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal number 7 on universal access to energy, Schroth said. He noted that as a result of COVID-19, for the first time in recent years, the number of people without access to energy increased. He added that the lack of access to energy on the continent is holding back the achievement of the other development goals.
“In view of the critical role of energy for development in general, the African Development Bank has placed energy at the top of its agenda for the continent,” said Schroth.
He also spoke about one of the bank’s key initiatives, Desert to Power, which covers the 11 countries of the Sahel. He said: “We are working with the governments of these countries on roadmaps and an initial set of priority projects to harness the region’s solar potential, but a lot of capital is required to achieve the goals of the initiative.”
Ambassador Anne Lugon-Moulin, Swiss Ambassador to Côte d’Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, highlighted Switzerland’s positive relationship with the African Development Bank as the continent’s leading development institution.
Switzerland is a member of the African Development Bank, which it joined in September 1982. It has been a shareholder in the African Development Fund, the group’s concessional lending window for low-income countries, since 1973. Switzerland is the 11th largest shareholder in the African Development Fund and has cumulatively contributed more than 2 billion Swiss francs to date.
Rutishauser said the African Development Bank was a priority multilateral institution for Switzerland, which increased its contribution to the most recent replenishment of the African Development Fund in December 2022 and its new climate change window. “This shows our strong cooperation,” he said.
Urama also highlighted the highlights of the Bank’s new report, the Africa Macroeconomic Performance and Outlook Report, released for the first time on Thursday, January 19 in Abidjan.
