What is most important is that we have some of the world’s best carbon sinks, essentially where the lungs for the world that will absorb all the carbon emissions that occur globally.
If you look at our per capita consumption for energy, it is about 170 kilowatts per hour, I think in Europe it is over 6000, I think in America is about 12,000.
The solution for us as Africans is that we must try to ensure that we have clear strategies to improve our energy access, and our energy access must be a mix of energy sources.
We articulated a solar power program that we committed $100 million and we got the green climate fund to also commit $100 million too but unfortunately, we couldn’t reach an agreement on the power purchase agreements that was required for the project to take off the ground.
More importantly, we are looking at the value addition of African produce and commodities for trade within the continental free trade area.
So we have done a study that shows that it is cheaper to produce parts of what is required for the electric vehicles and mobility of the future and that it is cheaper to do that in DRC than in the US, China or in Poland.
We have been around for 15 years with a very clear focus, which is to address Africa’s infrastructure deficit and improve its operating environment by developing and financing infrastructure projects across the continent.
We’ve also learned that we are not as well known, and our significant contributions of our people, our team and our core strength while it’s well known and well established, it’s not celebrated as well.
A lot of people would tell us that without us, several projects will not be built and it is our approach of engagement and partnership that makes these projects come through.
So, we’ve also learned that because we live it every day, it is a passion and commitment of our people to build the roads, bridges that will integrate and connect Africa within Africa and Africa to the rest of the world.
If you summarise all the things that I’ve said about our capacity to provide minerals and metals for the energy transition, our capacity to feed the world, our capacity to provide the carbon sinks that are solutions to climate change.
We’ve also put in place a framework for significant scaling up by appointing independent asset managers, and deploying a blended finance framework for pooling funds and walking working with managers that are experienced in raising third party capital globally.
So, if you look at Nigeria in particular, where we have short cycles of significant currency depreciation which is why we came up with the naira or local currency funding framework.
We have invested in over 20 projects in Nigeria, 49 per cent is in natural resources, 38 per cent is in heavy industries, telecoms and technology, 11 per cent is in power and 2 per cent is in transport.
That kind of credit enhancement is what is required from government, once government can provide that, there will be significant capital flow to Nigeria, for various infrastructure projects and indeed, to most of the African continent.
Government should provide the enhancement that would mobilise private capital to transport and energy that the private sector would fund and they can invest in security, education, health, water and sanitation that is not so easy the private sector to participate in.