Abidjan: The African Development Fund, the concessional arm of the African Development Bank Group, has sanctioned a grant amounting to $4.23 million to facilitate the second phase of a strategic initiative aimed at incorporating natural capital into development funding across Africa. The initiative will be implemented across thirteen nations, including Burundi, Cameroon, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ghana, C´te d'Ivoire, Kenya, Mozambique, Rwanda, Tanzania, Togo, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
According to the African Press Organization, the project will receive in-kind support from partner institutions like the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), the German international cooperation agency GIZ, the African Union Development Agency-New Partnership for Africa's Development, the Economic Commission for Africa, and the United Nations Environment Programme. These collaborations are set to create a conducive environment for optimizing the use of natural capital and integrating it into political and financial decision-making processes. The involved countries will also contribute to the project.
Scheduled to be carried out from October 2026 to September 2029, the project aims to deliver outcomes in policy, statistics, institutions, and knowledge that will facilitate the inclusion of natural capital in development planning. The strategy is designed to enhance policy-making systems, statistical systems, institutional frameworks, and knowledge-generation mechanisms, enabling regional member countries and the African Development Bank Group to evaluate natural capital and incorporate it into public policy-making.
The project will employ a comprehensive set of measures, including policy support, technical assistance, assessments of statistical readiness, biodiversity financing tools, pilot projects to evaluate green wealth, capacity building, and peer learning.
Innocent Onah, Chief Natural Resources Officer at the African Development Bank Group, expressed that the project aims to contribute to climate-resilient, nature-friendly, and inclusive development. The initiative is expected to enable African countries to more effectively identify, measure, and manage their natural assets, thereby strengthening the evidence base to inform development financing, policy dialogues, and the mobilization of green investments.
He further stated that in the long term, the project could lead to significant improvements in the target countries, including GDP growth, increased foreign direct investment inflows, economic development, poverty reduction, improved employment, economic competitiveness, and enhanced financial and economic risk ratings.