Leveraging the private sector to boost growth in Africa

The African Development Bank has made private sector development one of its key priorities for reducing poverty and supporting sustainable growth on the continent.


The implementation of the Bank's vision for the deployment of this sector combines three axes:

  • Improve investment and business climate
  • Enhance access to social and economic infrastructure
  • Foster enterprise development

The African Development Bank’s Private Sector financing window invests in commercially and financially sound operations, including private and eligible state-owned enterprises, that can generate development impact in our regional member countries and contribute to our twin objectives - inclusive growth and transition to green growth.

More than a creditor, the African Development Bank is a strategic and trusted partner:

  • AfDB has a long history of working on the continent with strong convening power and geographic and sectoral expertise, including in manufacturing, agribusiness and infrastructure (energy, transport, ICT, water and sanitation).
  • With a local presence through its country offices, the African Development Bank has a good working knowledge of the realities on the ground.
  • As a group that executes both sovereign and non-sovereign operations, the African Development Bank uses a holistic, coherent, synergetic and synchronized approach that addresses both the enablers of private sector development upstream and midstream (infrastructure, policy reforms, skills, etc.) as well as downstream investment in enterprise development.
  • Through a wide regional network and unparalleled access to governments, private sector and other strategic stakeholders, AfDB can crowd-in private capital and facilitate third-party financing.
  • Through its extensive financial solutions and patient capital, AfDB offers project developers and companies flexible financing options.
  • Beyond financing, the African Development Bank can deploy a wide variety of tools including technical assistance, country risk mitigation, data and knowledge.
Image