Africa: Encouraging Private-Public-Partnerships for African Development

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Casablanca Finance City (CFC) took another step forward in its goal to be the financial services hub for business in West, Central, and Atlantic Africa when the African Development Bank (AfDB) opened its Africa50 Fund headquarters in the CFC this week. The purpose of the Fund is to build private-public partnerships (PPPs) to finance national and regional infrastructure projects "to accelerate the continent's development rate." The concept crystallized in 2012 when African leaders "called for innovative solutions to facilitate and accelerate infrastructure delivery in Africa." This led to a recommendation for a PPP Fund that would reflect the lessons learned in critical sectors including energy, transportation, and water, and pursue projects that are development-oriented and commercially operated. Key to the Fund's ethos is that "operational decisions will be made by a management team selected solely on technical merit and demonstrated managerial competence."

Africa50 has two business areas - project development and project finance. The project development arm aims to increase the number of bankable infrastructure projects through substantial increases in early-stage project development activities working in tandem with highly skilled development experts. Project finance focuses on developing and launching investment vehicles needed to attract additional infrastructure financing.

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