RABAT / Morocco, 29 November 2025: Senior policymakers, investors and development-finance leaders gathered in Rabat on Thursday for the 2025 Africa Investment Forum Market Days, issuing a clear warning that the continent is fast running out of time to mobilise the capital required to meet soaring infrastructure and climate-finance needs.
At a panel titled “Innovative Finance Instruments Powering Africa’s Sustainable Transformation”, speakers emphasised that traditional funding models were no longer sufficient for a region set to add one billion people by 2050, more than half of them in urban centres. Africa currently invests only about $75 billion of the $150 billion required annually for infrastructure, while receiving just $30 billion of the $300 billion needed each year for climate-related interventions.
Moderating the session, Zineb Sqalli, Partner and Managing Director at the Boston Consulting Group, described the financing deficit as “massive but full of opportunity,” pointing to emerging tools such as blended-finance structures, Islamic green bonds, diaspora investment vehicles and new infrastructure platforms.
Setting a firm tone, Dr. Obaid Saif Hamad Al-Zaabi, Chairman of the Arab Authority for Agricultural Investment and Development, called for a fundamental rethink of food-system financing, noting that climate change now represents a financial risk rather than merely an environmental concern. He urged the expansion of guarantees, sustainable-finance instruments and targeted vehicles for smallholder farmers, whom he described as the “engine” of Africa’s food system. Digitalisation, he said, would be essential to reduce information asymmetry and strengthen investor confidence.
Addressing broader investment readiness, Amadou Hott, Chairman of the Africa Advisory Board of Vision Invest and former Senegalese Economy Minister, identified the scarcity of bankable projects as the continent’s most significant constraint. “To transform the continent, we need to multiply our efforts a hundredfold,” he said, calling for strengthened project-preparation capacity and measures to reduce currency risk. He also emphasised the need for African governments to mobilise more domestic capital from sovereign wealth funds, pension pools and national reserves, much of which currently remains invested abroad.
Dr. Nasser Al-Kahtani, Executive Director of the Arab Gulf Programme for Development, stressed that Africa would be unable to achieve its development targets without deepening inclusive finance. Smallholder farmers, he noted, produce 70% of the continent’s food yet remain among its most vulnerable. He advocated blended-finance models that enable countries to shift “from grants to investment,” while also helping micro-entrepreneurs build equity.
From the private sector, Jacques Kanga, Director and Head of Finance at Algest Investment Bank, outlined how targeted financial instruments could attract private capital to close the continent’s estimated annual funding shortfall of $130–170 billion. Infrastructure-focused Special Purpose Vehicles, blended-finance mechanisms to reduce project costs and diaspora-backed initiatives drawing on the $95 billion Africans abroad remit annually were highlighted as key tools to increase transparency and build investor confidence.
Legal expert Ouns Lemseffer, Partner at Ashurst, noted that several African countries were modernising their financial frameworks, enabling securitisation, project bonds, Sukuk issuance, debt funds and innovative financing for electrification initiatives such as Côte d’Ivoire’s Programme Électricité Pour Tous. However, she warned that progress remained uneven and urged policymakers to adopt holistic reforms—from investor regulations to bankruptcy protections—to truly unlock long-term capital for infrastructure.
The panel concluded with a unified message: innovative financing is indispensable for Africa’s future. The speakers emphasised that new financial instruments must play a central role in mobilising the scale of investment required to meet the continent’s demographic, climate and economic ambitions, transforming opportunities into bankable, transformative projects across Africa.