We are proud to announce The Financing Africa Forward Blueprint for Action has been formally adopted as a B20 Legacy Initiative at this year’s B20 Summit.
This recognition serves as a tremendous validation of the coalition driving this work and aligns our efforts directly with the global financial policy agenda.
A shared mission: reducing the cost of capital
Aligned with the priorities of the B20 Finance & Infrastructure Task Force, chaired by Sim Tshabalala, and advancing the recommendations of the G20 Africa Experts Panel, chaired by Trevor Manuel, this initiative brings global weight to a critical economic imperative: dismantling the “Africa Risk Premium.”
As Sim Tshabalala, CEO of Standard Bank, noted: “The additional borrowing costs wipe out about two percentage points on African gross domestic product.”
Speaking at the B20 Summit, Trevor Manuel, Chairman of The Africa Experts Panel, reinforced the urgency of the moment, stating, “The global system is arraigned against Africa.”
The blueprint in action
Developed in consultation with regulators, financiers, multilateral institutions, industry leaders, and philanthropy, the blueprint outlines strategic interventions designed to modernise financial architecture and unlock competitive investment.
Working in partnership with The ONE Campaign, and the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), and supported by Standard Bank Group, Africa Finance Corporation (AFC), and the Alliance of African Multilateral Financial Institutions (AAMFI), the coalition is currently prioritising four key initiatives to drive immediate impact:
- Risk-return data hub: building Africa’s first authoritative data repository for sovereign and corporate risk. By filling data gaps, we ensure capital is priced on reality, not assumptions.
- Blended finance standardisation task force: a concerted effort to streamline legal templates and clauses, reducing transaction costs and accelerating the deployment of investment into critical projects.
- Sovereign investor relations accelerator: a capacity-building programme equipping African governments to manage their financial narratives and engage global markets from a position of strength and transparency.
- African confidence campaign: a global, data-driven advocacy effort designed to shift the international narrative from “risk” to “return” across major financial centres.
Join the coalition
These interventions aim to rewrite the rules of how African economies are assessed and financed. By correcting market distortions and boosting creditworthiness, we can lower the cost of capital, enabling African growth to compound on its own terms.
We invite technical partners and funders to join us in this mission. We are actively seeking:
- Technical expertise: to assist in building robust data frameworks.
- Financial resources: to fund the secretariat’s work in directing and coordinating these critical advocacy efforts.
Financing Africa Foward 