The African Development Bank (AfDB) will increase its investment in the energy sector "significantly" over the next decade, while working with African countries to commit a larger share of tax revenue to the problem.
New AfDB president, Akinwumi Adesina, was cited in news reports as saying that Africa could achieve full access to power by 2025 – sooner than the goal of 2030 set by the United States and other major donor countries – while increasing its infrastructure and industrial capacity.
According to him, Africa’s growing energy challenges have put the brakes on the continent’s industrialisation goals and addressing this is “vital to drive Africa's economic transformation over the coming decades”.
"Africa could easily have double-digit growth if it solved the power problem," he said in an interview with Reuters news agency, noting that the sub-Saharan African countries, with a combined population of 800 million, produced roughly the same amount of power as Spain, a country of just 46 million.
