Contact Details
Headquarters Representative
Mr. Donald Kaberuka Mr. Lamin Barrow
President Resident Representative
African Development Bank African Development Bank (AfDB) Angle des 3 rues du Ghana, Pierre de Coubertin et Addis Ababa
Hdi Nouira
B.P 322, Tunis Belvedere 1002Tunisia
www.afdb.org
TEL:+216 7110 2047 +251 115 546 336
FAX;+216 7183 0172 +251 115 546 335
Point of reference at EGA: Office of the Executive Secretary (OES) Tel: +251 115 511231/+251 115 443336
1. Areas of Interest
The African Development Bank (AfDB) Group is a multilateral development finance institution whose objective is to mobilize resources to finance economic development and social projects and programmes in its Regional Member Gountries (RMGs).
The African Development Bank (AfDB) Group's mission is to help reduce poverty, improve living conditions for Africans and mobilize resources for the continent's economic and social development.
With this objective in mind, the institution aims at assisting African countries - individually and collectively - in their efforts to achieve sustainable economic development and social progress.
Gombating poverty is at the heart of the continent's efforts to attain sustainable economic growth. To this end, the Bank seeks to stimulate and mobilize internal and external resources to promote investments as well as provide its regional member countries with technical and financial assistance.
The main objectives of the AfDB Group include;
• contributing to the economic development and social progress of its regional member countries, individually and collectively;
• using resources at its disposal to finance investment projects and programmes, giving priority to projects that cut across several member countries;
• mobilizing resources through co-financing with bilateral and multilateral development agencies as well as funds from financial markets;
• promoting international dialogue and understanding on development issues concerning Africa;
• fostering government and private investment in Africa through policy reforms;
EGA Partners Profiles 2010
• providing much-needed technical assistance to African countries for the selection, study and preparation of development projects.
The various lending instruments that the Bank uses are: Project loans, Lines of credit. Sector investment and rehabilitation loan investments. Sector adjustment loans. Structural adjustment loans, and Technical assistance operations
The Bank Group Medium Term Strategy for 2008-2012 emphasizes greater selectivity and focuses on core operations such as infrastructure development, governance, private sector development and higher education. Through these operations, the Bank Group directly helps in promoting regional integration, increasing assistance to fragile states, low and middle income countries, as well as human development and agriculture. Knowledge-based operations, climate change and gender equality form part of the Bank's operational mandates.
2. History and co-operation with ECA
The cooperation with the AfDB started long back. During the last decade, the AfDB has supported ECA financially in implementing some of its activities. These are: Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper Learning Group/Strategic Partnership with Africa, US$35,483.06 (Feb. 2003); Study of the Progress towards Good Governance in Morocco, Mozambique and Rwanda, US$276,387.50 (Dec. 2003);
African Development Forum IV, US$200,000 (2006), Study of Resource Management Capacity work stream, US$ 150,000 (Dec. 2007); and, UNECA-CODESRIA International Conference on Institutions, Culture and Corruption in Africa, US$ 31,144.40 (Apr. 2009).
The Coalition for Dialogue on Africa (CoDA) is a joint venture of the African Development Bank (AfDB), the African Union Commission (AUC) and the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA).
CoDA is completely African owned and based in Africa. The initiative is an institutionally independent forum which aims to stimulate informal and inclusive dialogue on African socioeconomic issues
between diverse groups of stakeholders.
The objective of CoDA is to stimulate informal and inclusive dialogue between diverse and influential groups of stakeholder. Its core activities encompass the commissioning of research and convening of dialogue forums on critical themes and issues, as well as the advocacy for and information dissemination of, CoDA findings and recommendations.
Additionally, CoDA has a lobbying and advocacy role to promote tine incorporation of its deliberations into the African development agenda.
Since the inception of CoDA, ECA has benefited from the AfDB a total grant amount of US$589,969.49 during 2009.
3. Geographic concentration of development assistance
In line with its mission statement, the AfDB Group provides financing to its 53 regional member countries for projects that will effectively contribute to their economic and social development and have the strongest poverty reduction impact in these countries. Projects and programmes submitted
67
ECA Partners Profiles 2010
for funding by borrowing member countries must be in conformity with jointly agreed development policies and strategies of both the countries and the institution.
Project identification may require the help of AfDB experts, especially in the Bank's Category A countries (or less developed countries with per capita GNP of less than US$785, and are eligible for ADF concessionary resources only). The AfDB can provide technical assistance to help the country identify and prepare a project for possible financing.
The Partnerships and Cooperation Unit of the Bank mobilizes untied grant resources from the 24 non-regional member countries with which the institution also has bilateral partnership agreements to fund technical assistance, capacity building and feasibility studies based on grant. As at the end of December 2007, as many as 38 African countries fell under this category while 13 countries considered as Middle Income Countries only access AfDB resources. Two countries are eligible for a blend of AfDB and African Development Fund resources.
4. History
Founded in 1964, The AfDB comprises three distinct entities under one management: the African Development Bank (AfDB), parent institution established in 1964, and two concessional resource affiliates, the African Development Fund (ADF) established in 1972 and the Nigerian Trust Fund (NTF), established in 1976.
All African countries together with 24 non-African countries are shareholders of the bank. The AfDB's headquarters is in Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire. Flowever, since 2003, it has been operating from its Temporary Relocation Agency (TRA) in Tunis, Tunisia, because of the prevailing political situation in Cote d lvoire.
AfDB's tangible achievements over the years have generated confidence in the institution as demonstrated by the reconfirmation of its triple (AAA) ratings by major global rating agencies. In December 2007, the ADF achieved a record replenishment of US$ 8.9 billion for the institution's low income member countries. The Bank is now positioning itself as the continent's leading development finance institution thanks to its adoption of a 2008-2012 mid-term development strategy (MDS) geared mainly towards core areas such as infrastructure and private sector development, higher education, regional integration and governance.
In accordance with its policy of decentralization aimed at taking its operations closer to its beneficiaries, the Bank has, over the past few years, established about 23 field and country offices across the continent.
EC A Partners Profiles 2010