By Martin Ekpeke
African financial leaders and policymakers have issued a powerful call to overhaul how the continent’s technological future is funded, shifting the focus from a shortage of ideas to a shortage of well-structured capital.
At a high-level session during the 58th Session of the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), the Alliance of African Multilateral Financial Institutions (AAMFI)—known as the Africa Club met to tackle the primary bottleneck holding back the continent’s digital revolution: The cost and structure of money.
Africa’s digital economy is expanding at a breakneck pace. However, the infrastructure behind it remains starved of affordable, long-term investment. Leaders at the summit identified four binding constraints that have historically scared off investors. These include high costs of capital and currency volatility risks. There is also a lack of early-stage seed funding and a shortage of bankable projects ready for investment.
Hanan Morsy, Deputy Executive Secretary and Chief Economist at the UN ECA, stated that Africa’s innovation challenge is not a shortage of ideas. She noted that the real challenge is a shortage of long-term, affordable, and well-structured financing.
The proposed solution isn’t just more money, but smarter money. The summit outlined a strategic shift toward blended finance, a model that mixes public development funds with private capital to lower risk.
By using guarantees and co-financing mechanisms, African institutions aim to make high-tech sectors like Artificial Intelligence (AI) and digital infrastructure more attractive to global and local investors.
Haytham Elmaayergi of the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) noted that capital is available, but the bridge to reach it is broken. “One of Africa’s key challenges is… a shortage of bankable projects and stronger institutional collaboration to scale investment,” he explained.
How Africa Stands to Benefit
The successful implementation of these coordinated and practical solutions is expected to trigger a domino effect across the continent’s economy. Scaling tech startups and innovation hubs will create millions of high-skilled jobs for Africa’s youth. Access to AI and digital tools will modernize agriculture, manufacturing, and trade. Increased reliance on African-owned institutions will reduce vulnerability to global financial shifts. Furthermore, investment will not just focus on software. It will also support the energy and connectivity grids required to power a digital age.
The session underscored that the old ways of banking don’t work for the fast-paced tech world. Adeniran Aderogba, CEO of the Regional Maritime Development Bank, emphasized that risk in the technology space is harder to structure than in traditional industries. The call for creative financing models suggests that African institutions are ready to act more like venture capitalists than traditional lenders to support early-stage innovation.
As the session concluded, the mandate was clear: for Africa to lead in the next industrial revolution, its financial architecture must be as innovative as the entrepreneurs it seeks to fund. By reducing costs and sharing risks, the Africa Club is positioning itself to be the engine room of the continent’s digital and economic transformation.