Faced with colossal financing needs and increasingly unsustainable debt, Africa has high expectations for reforms to the global financial architecture. If successful, they could enable it to mobilize several hundred billion dollars per year, but the road remains fraught with pitfalls, according to experts, in a context where the continent’s needs amount to USD 1.6 trillion by 2030. In this context, reforms to the global financial architecture, led by the African Development Bank, appear to be a potential lifeline.
Africa faces a daunting economic equation with unprecedented financing needs, increasingly difficult debt to support, and access to international markets that is both restricted and costly. Ongoing reforms to the global financial architecture, whether by the World Bank, the IMF, or the African Development Bank, offer promising avenues. But their scope remains far short of the continent’s needs, in a context where Africa needs approximately $130 to $170 billion per year to meet its infrastructure needs alone.
« It is also imperative that Africa develops its financial sovereignty in terms of mobilizing domestic resources, but also by creating favorable conditions to attract foreign direct investment to build resilient infrastructures. »
Sidi Ould Tah, President of the AfDB – Mauritania
According to the latest joint data from the IMF and the World Bank, nine low-income African countries are already in debt distress, and 26 others are at high risk. In addition to the burden of debt servicing, the continent’s states are also suffering from rising global interest rates. After a tentative recovery, with $13 billion in bond issues in 2024, the financing window closed again in 2025 due to high US interest rates and investor reluctance.
« Today, it is no longer about managing development, but rather accelerating it. This is why I believe it is imperative to restructure Africa’s financial framework, developing greater synergies between the African Development Bank and other African financial institutions, as well as with all stakeholders involved in financing and development on the continent. »
Sidi Ould Tah, President of the AfDB – Mauritania
According to the outgoing president of the African Development Bank, Akinwumi Adesina, the current international financial architecture provides uneven fiscal responses to developing countries during times of global shocks. According to the former AfDB president, while fiscal measures taken to combat the Covid-19 pandemic amounted to $17 trillion, or 19% of global GDP, Africa received only $89 billion, or 0.5% of the global value.
« The decisions we make in the coming years will be decisive for Africa’s future, especially in light of its demographic evolution. »
Sidi Ould Tah, President of the AfDB – Mauritania
Moreover, experts believe that reforming the global financial architecture for the benefit of Africa would provide access to financing at a sustainable cost to the continent, debt management and sustainability, a reallocation of global financial resources and mobilization of the private sector as well as new instruments. This reform, according to the African Development Bank, should strengthen the role and capacity of multilateral development banks and thus enable the continent to secure several hundred billion USD per year, and meet its needs, estimated at 1,600 billion USD by 2030 according to the African Development Bank and the African Union.
