Author: APO Group

The Board of Directors of the African Development Bank Group (www.AfDB.org) has approved a $20 million flexible loan to finance Seychelles’ Governance and Economic Reforms Support Program, expected to help drive the island nation’s macroeconomic stability and recovery from Covid-19 in the medium-term.

The government program aims to deepen reforms introduced through the Bank’s Covid-19 Crisis Response Budget Support Program, approved in June 2020 for $10 million. These reforms are expected to advance fiscal sustainability, improve the business environment and Seychelles’ climate change and environmental resilience. (https://www.colburnschool.edu/)

The Bank’s financing will complement funds from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund in support of reforms that will benefit Seychelles’ private sector, dominated by small enterprises. By ensuring that such businesses stay afloat during these challenging times, the operation will positively impact women and the youth, while creating employment and equal opportunities.

Seychelles’ Minister of Finance, …

The Board of Directors of the African Development Bank Group (www.AfDB.org) has approved a loan of $4.25 million to the Lesotho Revenue Authority to provide digital tax services, including e-taxation and e-payment, that will broaden the country’s tax base and boost government revenue.

The funds, to be sourced from the African Development Fund, the Group’s concessional lending window, will go to support the Supplemental Financing of the Lesotho Tax Modernization Project. The project follows the Lesotho Tax Modernization Project (LTMP) approved in November 2017, and for which the African Development Bank Group provided $7.09 million, in financing.

Specifically, financing will be used to procure and install e-taxation, e-payment, and e-invoicing software and hardware and to integrate financial institutions and mobile money providers into e-payment systems.

“The project will allow broadening of the tax base through simplifying and streamlining the tax regime and procedures for the small business and …

The Covid-19 pandemic has provided the impetus for a stronger partnership between India and Africa with potential benefits to both as they build back sustainably after the crisis, experts attending the 16th CII-Exim Bank Digital Conclave on India-Africa Project Partnership (https://bit.ly/3rgmnDG) affirmed.

Speaking at the virtual event’s opening, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, India External Affairs Minister said the two sides must reinforce collaboration in public health, digital delivery, capacity building, and the green economy – “our goals must be to use these new tools and practices for better delivery on the ground.”

“India has always maintained that progress in the world is contingent on the development of the global south, nowhere is that more evident than in Africa, and that is why we adapt as the most priority to the India-Africa partnership,” Jaishankar said.

The three-day virtual conference, with the theme Harnessing the Africa-India Opportunity- Connect, Create, Collaborate, was …

Achieving African integration is not an end in itself. The purpose must be to offer the African citizenry prosperity and security. The objective of both regional and continental integration must enable African countries benefit from economies of scale, trade amongst themselves, move freely across the continent and most importantly, benefit from the common goals of Africa’s Agenda 2063, aimed at shared prosperity, unity and integration. The commemorative activities of the African Integration Day that kicked off on the 7th of July, will examine into details, the status of the continental integration and with particular focus on the role of continental integration in accelerating African economic recovery from the COVID-19 Pandemic.

In the last two decades, Africa has recorded a 4.6 percent growth rate on average, despite an unfavourable international economic and financial environment. The current COVID-19 pandemic has however plunged the continent into its first recession in 25 years exposing …

A data collection and analysis initiative led by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the African Union Commission (AUC) has revealed 7 billion trees outside forests for the first time, among other findings. The survey is the first consistent land use representation of the continent and discloses more forests and more arable lands than were previously detected.

FAO and the AUC presented the findings today of the Africa Open DEAL (Data for Environment, Agriculture and Land) initiative which has made Africa the first continent to complete the collection of accurate, comprehensive, and harmonized digital land use and land-use change data. It provides a detailed snapshot of the continent, captured through more than 300 000 sampling points between 2018 and 2020.

“The Africa DEAL shows that science and innovation can provide real solutions and that collaboration and pooling experience leads to the best results. It supports …

Urging unity and action to accelerate nutrition targets amid the global Covid-19 pandemic, representatives of the African Development Bank (www.AfDB.org), the Aliko Dangote Foundation and Big Win Philanthropy renewed their commitment to end child stunting and other forms of malnutrition through the Banking on Nutrition Partnership (https://bit.ly/3wEhp4H).

The partners convened during a high-level panel discussion held on 8 July, organized by the African Development Bank. They shared lessons learned, experiences, achievements of the Banking on Nutrition Partnership since its inception five years ago. They also discussed its implementation within the African Development Bank and its Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Action Plan, as well as measures to encourage other organizations and development banks to integrate nutrition into their portfolios.

“The Bank is relentless in pursuing bold targets to unlock Africa’s human and economic potential. It is our aim to inspire other actors to recognize nutrition as central to that …

The International Islamic Trade Finance Corporation (ITFC) (www.ITFC-idb.org) and its partner the Statistical, Economic and Social Research and Training Centre for Islamic Countries (SESRIC) has launched a technical report on the potential impacts of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) on selected OIC countries, namely Côte d’Ivoire, Egypt, Guinea, Mozambique, Tunisia and Uganda.

The objective of the AfCFTA is to integrate, diversify and enhance the industrialision of the  African economies of about 1.3 billion people with a combined gross domestic product (GDP) of US$2.5 trillion in current prices, or US$6.8 trillion based on purchasing power parity (PPP).

To shed light on the important findings of the research report, a virtual event was organised with the participation of Eng. Hani Salem Sonbol, CEO of ITFC; Mr. Nabil Daboor, Director General, SESRIC; Mrs. Ngone Diop: Director of UNECA – Sub-regional Office West Africa; Mr. Saliou Sow, AfCFTA Chief Negotiator for Guinea; …

An estimated 23,000 lives per year could be saved and up to $2 billion in economic losses averted by improving weather forecasts, early warning systems, and climate information in low- and middle-income countries, according to a new report (https://bit.ly/3xAkDay) issued by the Alliance for Hydromet Development (https://bit.ly/3k7041u).

Known as hydromet, reliable and accurate weather and climate services, such as early warning systems, create benefits worth at least ten times their costs and are vital to building resilience to extreme weather. And yet, only 40 percent of countries currently have effective multi-hazard early warning systems in place, and large gaps remain in the vital underpinning observations data upon which these services depend.

“The first Hydromet Gap Report tells us how far we have to go to ensure all people have access to accurate, timely, weather and climate information. It presents the challenges of the complex global and local undertaking required for …

The South African Aerospace, Maritime and Defence Industries Association (AMD) (www.AMD.org.za) is currently playing an important yet largely unsung role in South Africa’s economy and civil society, with enormous potential to drive positive change even further.

This is according to Sandile Ndlovu, Interim Executive Director: AMD, who explains, “The AMD is a grouping of South African aerospace and defence registered entities whose focus is in high technology capabilities including the design, development, testing, evaluation, manufacturing, operating, upgrading, maintenance, repair and overhaul of air (including space) & sea (i.e. maritime & naval) platforms and their sub-systems – including items that are regarded as “dual-use” for purposes both locally and abroad.

This critical arena requires a special and unique level of government support that is not necessarily pertinent to other local business arenas.

“Around the world, the value of a country’s defence sector to its economy is enormous. It exists to provide …

The Board of Directors of the African Development Bank Group (www.AfDB.org) has approved a €39 million (46.3M USD) loan package for the construction of the Kinguélé Aval hydroelectric project in Gabon.

The package comprises €20 million (23.7 million USD) from the African Development Bank, €10 million (11.87 million USD)from the Africa Growing Together Fund and €9 million (10.7 M USD) in concessional financing from the Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa, a special multi-donor fund managed by the African Development Bank.

Additional financing to meet the project’s €133.8 million (158.9M USD) budget will come from the International Finance Corporation of the World Bank Group, the Canada-IFC Program for Renewable Energy in Africa, the Development Bank of Southern Africa and the Emerging Africa Infrastructure Development Fund. The loan funds will be disbursed to Asonha Énergie S.A., a company created to manage the project.

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