Harare, 08 August 2024: – Senior Executive Vice President Denys Denya on 29 July 2024 led the Afreximbank delegation to the SADC Industrialisation Week Investment Forum in Harare where he delivered remarks on key interventions to catalyse industrialisation, investment and boost inter-regional trade.
Organised by the Government of Zimbabwe, in partnership with Afreximbank, the Forum was convened in collaboration with the Ministry of Industry and Commerce of Zimbabwe, the Zimbabwe Investment and Development Agency, the SADC Secretariat and the SADC Business Council.
Mr. Denya informed the participants that Africa needed all hands on the deck in order for African countries to industrialise, especially during the current Fourth Industrial Revolution.
He described the current state of affairs as ‘unacceptable’ and made the case for advancing the cause of industrialisation through Africa Direct Investment (ADI) and Foreign Direct Investment within the SADC region and across the broader African continent, to “transform our continent”.
Mr. Denya noted that one significant constraint to attracting finance into Africa had been the absence of bankable industrial and manufacturing projects, due to lack of resources to undertake feasibility and required technical studies and announced that Afreximbank was trying to close that gap through its project preparation facility and its investment promotion initiatives.
Those initiatives included the launch of the Afreximbank Africa Direct Investment Report, which seeks to promote intra-African investments, he said. “We have just completed a report on ADI, which will be published before the end of the year, and we have also developed a framework that would be used by investment promotion agencies and other stakeholders to measure ADI and put forward interventions to facilitate and promote ADI. The initiative will also facilitate the implementation of both the AfCFTA and SADC protocols on investment.”
Mr. Denya added that Afreximbank is ready to support the trade and investment transactions and deals agreed on the margins of the SADC Investment Forum using its suite of financing products and initiatives which include grant financing, project preparation facilities, advisory and capital markets solutions, capacity building and advocacy, equity mezzanine and debt financing, facilitation and guarantees solutions.
He also highlighted some of the key investment projects the Bank has supported in the SADC region which include funding of USD 70 million and provision of investment guarantees that unlocked USD 300 million for the Zimborders project in Zimbabwe, the $100 million Afreximbank African Trade Centre investment in Zimbabwe, USD 44 million for the Lucara project in Botswana and USD100 million for the Cabinda oil Refinery in Angola. While some of the major pipeline projects include the USD 2 billion Amufert Petrochemical fertilizer plant in Angola and the USD 529 million Nyanza Light Metals Titanium Dioxide Pigment plant in South Africa.
Mr Denya also informed the SADC region about the other interventions that are being implemented by the Bank to catalyse industrialisation including the development and financing of industrial parks, the establishment of the Africa Trade and Distribution Company that will provide market intelligence, aggregate products produced by smallholder farmers, small and medium enterprises and even large manufacturers; and provide transport and logistics to take the products to the market. Mr Denya informed the audience that Afreximbank was also implementing the USD 2 billion Export Agriculture for Food Security Initiative (ExAFs), which seeks to boost agricultural production, agro-processing and trade. Some of the opportunities that are being explored by Afreximbank under ExAFS for Zimbabwe include the $170 million Grain Marketing Board Silo Project, $45 million for a cotton beneficiation project by the Cotton Company of Zimbabwe and the re-establishment of the Zimbabwe’s beef Export Market for USD 231 million.
Speaking during the opening session of the SADC Investment Forum, Dr Gainmore Zanamwe, Director for Trade Facilitation and Investment Promotion at Afreximbank, highlighted that while Afreximbank is promoting FDI, the Bank is now putting more emphasis on promoting Africa Direct Investment as this type of investment has been neglected but it is likely to be more sustainable as it is being driven by African investors who understand the African market. He also stated that Afreximbank has developed a suite of investment instruments and guarantees to de-risk investment projects and facilitate investment into the continent. Dr Zanamwe also stated that Afreximbank provides training and capacity building to Investment Promotion Agencies as well as support in terms of identifying potential investors, organising Investment Forums and developing bankable investment projects.
Ms. Oluranti Doherty, Managing Director, Export Development, was a speaker on the panel on ‘Agro-Industrial Transformation for Food Security through Special Economic Zones (SEZs)’. She explained that the Bank under its Sixth Strategic Plan has prioritized the implementation of the SEZs to support its member countries improve the capacity to design, develop, finance and implement these projects learning from the success of East Asian countries in attracting FDIs through SEZs. Ms. Doherty further disclosed that the Bank had disbursed over US$1 billion to facilitate the development of “inside the fence and outside the fence infrastructure” in SEZs in Gabon, Benin, and Togo, whilst advancing pipeline deals of over US$2 billion in Cote d’Ivoire, Chad, Malawi, Botswana, Kenya, DRC, Zambia, Rwanda, and Nigeria.
ENDS