According to the bank, a “powerful” alliance was made on Monday between US president Barack Obama and the president of the African Development Bank Akinwumi Adesina at the United Nations General Assembly of World Leaders summit.
The bank noted that Obama’s Power Africa initiative, aimed at forging partnerships with African governments to bring electricity to some of the most impoverished parts of the developing world, was already working to double access to electricity in sub-Saharan Africa.
The goal of the initiative, launched in 2013, is to add 60 million new electricity connections and generate 30,000 megawatts of new and cleaner power.
“Africa has today over $82 trillion in discovered natural resources,” Adesina said.
“We must add value to these resources so the wealth will stay on our continent.”
The only way that will happen, he said, is through industrialisation powered by reliable sources of energy.
The new UN’s development agenda sets priorities for trillions of dollars in spending. It has 17 development goals set out to end poverty, boost growth and tackle climate change across the globe over the next 15 years.
