Africa Finance Corporation to launch fund for climate resilience investments

Africa Finance Corporation (AFC) on Tuesday announced plans for a fund that will seek to raise USD 500 million (EUR 423m) in the next 12 months and USD 2 billion over the next three years to help make Africa less vulnerable to climate change.

The Infrastructure Climate Resilient Fund (ICRF) is the first offering of AFC Capital Partners, AFC’s newly created asset management arm. It will act as a direct investor and a co-investment fund to improve African ports, roads, bridges, rail, telecommunications, clean energy and logistics, AFC said.

AFC Capital Partners will be led by Ayaan Zeinab Adams, the former leader of the private sector arm of the Green Climate Fund under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, and a former CIO and senior manager of the World Bank Group’s International Finance Corporation (IFC).

“Significant financing is urgently required to build physical infrastructure that will survive the forces of climate change,” said Ayaan Zeinab Adams. “The good news is that much of this investment is compatible with competitive returns for investors through leveraging the expertise, relationships, and blended finance models that have been tried and assessed for many years by Africa Finance Corporation,” she added.

(USD 1 = EUR 0.846)

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