The event will mark the 61st meeting of the Board of Governors of the AfDB and the 52nd meeting of the African Development Fund, bringing together representatives from 81 member countries.

This year’s theme, “Mobilising Africa’s development financing at scale in a fragmented world”, reflects concerns over tightening global capital flows and rising development needs across the continent. Reduced inflows of official development assistance, higher borrowing costs and uncertainty in global supply chains have added pressure on financing strategies.

Africa’s development financing gap is estimated at about $400 billion per year, with funding needs spanning infrastructure, energy, food security, climate adaptation and job creation. The meetings are expected to examine how to mobilise resources more effectively, including through domestic capital and regional financial systems.

The discussions will be the first annual meetings under the leadership of Sidi Ould Tah, who assumed the Presidency of the AfDB in September 2025. One of the early developments during this period was the seventeenth replenishment of the African Development Fund, which raised about $11 billion in December 2025. The facility provides concessional financing to low-income and fragile countries.

African countries contributed about $182.7 million to the fund, marking participation from 24 countries. The fund forms part of efforts to support development projects through grants and low-interest loans.

The meetings are also expected to focus on proposals under the New African Financial Architecture for Development, an initiative aimed at improving the use of domestic financial resources. African pension funds, sovereign wealth funds and similar instruments are estimated to hold about $4 trillion, although these assets are not always efficiently mobilised.

–AfDB/ChannelAfrica–