 Hello. Good afternoon, everybody. We're going to start shortly. Hello. Welcome again, everybody. Good afternoon and welcome to the high-level dialogue on renewable energy and sustainable economic development turning a vision into reality for Africa. My name is Misha Hedra and I'm the Vice Minister for Climate and Energy of the Netherlands. And today Vice Chair of the IAEA Ministerial. I look forward to this dialogue, which I think is on a very timely subject. Today we have with us a very eminent list of guests and speakers, including energy ministers from countries from the African continent, officials from international institutions and representatives of the private sector. A special warm welcome to the ministers from Egypt, Tarek Almola, Kenya, Davis Chirer and Senegal, Antoine Diolm, whose countries became associate members of the IAEA in 2022 and 2023 just before the special 50th anniversary. We have a little less than an hour and 15 minutes because we have to vacate this room immediately afterwards and I want to give everybody the opportunity to speak. I promise to be a strict moderator today. We have a printed time schedule on the tables for everybody's reference and the screen will turn red if a speaker exceeds the time awarded. Therefore, without further ado, I'm pleased that Laura Kozi, the Director of Sustainability Technology and Outlooks at the IAEA joins us for some opening remarks at this high-level dialogue. Laura, the floor is yours. Thank you very much, Michel, and very many thanks to the Netherlands for really wanting to have this meeting about Africa. I have to say that it's the first time since our Executive Director opened the door that we are having here at our Ministerial Meeting part of the IAEA family, here at our table, Egypt, Senegal and Kenya, and it's really with warm, warm heart that we welcome you here and we want to listen and hear from you. It's wonderful to have you here at the table. We also have our long-sending partner. I can even call her a friend if she allows me to, the Commissioner for the African Union, Amania Bosaid. So, very, very quickly, what's the issue? The issue is the following. All of us know that Africa is the continent in the world that has the richest endowment in solar, in hydro, in wind, in critical minerals, in fossil fuels, very, very rich in resources. What's the issue then? Why are we having this meeting? Numbers. What our numbers show is actually that Africa last year attracted 3% of global energy investment, 3%. Having 40% of the best solar resources, having most of cobalt, having most of hydro resources and being home to one in five people in the world. This is really problematic. And if you look at what has happened over the past several years, there are two facts that are, in my view, outrageous, is that the investments actually, the level of investments were down and the share of investments in global investment went down too. So, here around this table, we have countries that were able to actually attract more investments so they have lessons to share with the others. One of our key analysis and finding shows that one of the key reasons why this is happening is that the cost of capital for energy projects and for clean energy projects in African countries is two to three times more expensive than in the rest of the world. So, we are here all together to try to find ways to make sure that the money flows and it flows at reasonable rates. Now, here at the IEA, we provide analysis but I want to spend the last 30 seconds here to also tell you that more and more our executive director is pointing us to action. So, three actions that we are doing with our partners in Africa this year. The first with Kenya, Minister Churchill himself is going to host for the first time in Africa the Global Energy Efficiency Conference and we are very grateful for that. We are supporting Italy G7 that is working in partnership with African countries to put Italy at the center of the G7. And finally, with the president of Tanzania, the president, prime minister of Norway and our executive director, on the 14th of May we hope many of you will be back here in Paris at a conference looking at clean cooking. With this, I will conclude and pass back the floor to the chair. Thank you very much, Laura. Very impressive numbers. Three percent of investments at the same time two to three times more expensive. This will be put into more context by Dr Amani Abu-Zahid. Thank you for joining us today. The Energy Commission of the African Union and she will provide us with a keynote speech and setting the scene for our discussion. Thank you for the introduction and allow me at the outset to thank the Netherlands for hosting this meeting. To thank all of you for coming to this meeting and definitely to thank the IEA not just for this meeting but for the extent where they have been providing to all of us and especially the work on Africa to which together we have dedicated two reports now dedicated to Africa. And it's important actually to do that. And now let us remember all of us. We all know the number of 600 million people without electricity and one billion persons Africans do not have access to clean cooking. We also know that Africa that six percent of the global energy use and only three percent of the of the electricity demand mean this is serious. But we are not here again to dwell on what Africa has or doesn't have actually doesn't have because we are deficient in energy all the way. And here of course I'm talking about Africa as a continent. Things are different from one country to another. And let us bear in mind that even those among us who have 100 percent coverage or access to electricity for some is not affordable. And for all it's not enough because we are also increasing in numbers. I mean demographically all the time which which means that we are continuously in race with ourselves. So what needs to be done. And I'm not here again to advocate the case of Africa. I think we made the case a long time ago. Now what needs to be done one the major the major challenge is capital massive injection of capital not just capital but massive injection of capital at a cost that is reasonable. That really reflects the reality that one that is supports all the ambitions not only that Africa have that all of you have because the future of all of us in this room is linked together not only on the climate agenda but specifically on the energy agenda since again Africa is at the heart of this energy agenda and Africa very much could be the powerhouse of the world because of its potential but however excellencies you know that we cannot eat potential. Potential has to be fulfilled. So we are here to make it happen. Second major challenge is economic conditions. And here I'm talking to our ministers here in the room and those beyond because it's only the ministers of energy investment in energy is cannot be the link from investment overall. The climate investment in our countries is not conducive for proper investment does not always welcome the private sector and the laws that keep changing from one month to another or with the changes of leadership is not going to help us. We have a green window of opportunity that we have to use for the first time in our history. The world is listening to what Africa needs in terms of energy. Tragically it only happened since 2022. But well being what they are we have to use this window of opportunity to our benefit. Three we are thinking of energy of course holistically. So demand and supply. Generation electricity is one thing. Grid is another thing. So here to all of us our plans should include grid. And remember that 30 percent of the energy actually produced 30 to 40 percent is wasted because of our run down you know grids and for the majority of the continent grids do not even exist. Fourth point micro grids wonderful for remote areas for some villages. But our ambition is to industrialize. Our ambition is growth. Our ambition is development. So we need the big butts. We need the big projects. And again it's not just for ourselves but for the whole for the whole world. Remember I mean I mentioned the people who live and die. Remember there are people who die every minute of the day of despair and we have to provide jobs and we have to provide growth for everyone on this continent and in the world. We are not of course just sitting here either not doing anything. Africa is doing more than its share when it comes to climate. Remember 20 more than 20 of our countries depend mainly on renewable energy for the for the energy production energy generation. Some countries like my brother here in Kenya tell you that almost 90 percent of the grid you know is renewables. All of our countries whether they are fossil producers or consumers all have renewable energy projects we know because we want to use what we have and we need what we have. So we are not here to to say otherwise. And we have been investing heavily in infrastructure in general 60 percent of these investments come from our own national budgets. So not from abroad or not from partners and 37 percent of the regional projects come out of our national budget. Having said that the partnerships that we are having across the the continent with the nationally or region are wonderful. And I want here to thank all of you. I don't want to single out each and everyone not to make any protocol mistakes but let me just talk about you know the African single energy market a huge program and project you know with a master plan that we are doing together with the European Union and which hopefully we see the light on 20 in 20 40 to cover all energy needs in Africa and to export. Just for you also to know gas is gas is very much you know a part of our energy mix as transition fuel and as also base load. 20 African countries are contemplating nuclear energies in various stages. Now with SMRs there are beautiful things happening also on on nuclear and last but not least we need to industrialize develop the local value chains in whatever that is coming when it comes to storage or the new technologies and for our countries to create also local value chains for beneficiation not just for export. So these are all things that we can do together. It's hard for me to squeeze everything in five minutes. I've been trying but I hope I stimulated you enough you know just you know to create a positive conversation and I'll be happy of course to talk to you after the session. Thank you very much. Fantastic vision of Africa as the powerhouse of the world with industrial production with modern technologies and a lot of opportunities here and we're going to hear some of the success stories and some of the needs that still exist from three of the next speakers from the African continent and they will give short interventions on their vision how to make this vision turn into a reality. A first turn to Mr. Davis, Chair, Minister of Energy in Kenya and as said by the energy commissioner just now Kenya is at the forefront of using renewable electricity already and is already considering export opportunities. Can you tell us a little bit more about your experiences and some of the challenges that you face? Floor is yours. Thank you Michel and let me also thank Netherlands for hosting us for this high level discussion on renewable in the way forward. I think it's befitting really to have a session like this to discuss what we need to do within this continent of opportunity. Like has been mentioned we have had the numbers with respect to minerals that we critical minerals that we have to possibly process them and rather than export them as raw, develop power in scale and speed to be able to really ensure that we are able to provide some of this critical minerals that are necessary for the development of renewable storage and so on and so forth in scale and speed. What we've basically learned in our country with the advent of the challenge of climate change has been to work more critically on geothermal. Earlier I want to focus on because I will talk slightly more on to the green hydrogen. What we did a while ago was to accelerate the development of geothermal through the risking of geothermal fields. So what we did as government was to develop a geothermal development company that commanded was basically to the risk the fields. Geothermal development is very expensive in the initial phase opening up the infrastructure and identifying the geothermal resource by possibly drilling, mapping and drilling two, three, four wells and being able to give it out to the private sector to develop. That way we've been able to accelerate geothermal development and today Kenya stands worldwide in geothermal energy mix. We are number one. We dispatch 50% of energy mix is geothermal. Of course we've got hydro, wind and solar. We have one of the largest or the largest wind farm in Africa like Turcana wind farm which develops 310 megawatts from a single place. Turcana like has been, I think it's important if my president was here, he likes to identify Turcana where the first human remains were discovered as the home of mankind. And he likes to invite everybody to come home where humanity started. And so when you come home in May for the ninth global energy efficiency conference, you'll be coming home and my president says it's unfair to ask people to come home with a visa. So you come to Kenya without a visa. It's a visa free country today. So welcome to Kenya for the ninth energy efficiency conference in May and you come home without a visa. In the geothermal development where we've did most of the fields, we'll have so much steam developed at scale and therefore we are able to invite investors to convert this steam to power by bringing in the turbines. We work very closely with the Toshibas and Mitsubishi and so on and so forth in the turbine industry. And we do convert our geothermal energy very competitively at about 6 centuries to the grid, which is very competitive compared to fossil fuel, compared to of course, I know at scale, wind and solar, but more importantly geothermal is a good base load. It's available 100% of the time except for down times when you are servicing the equipment. So it's a very good base load for us as Kenya. What we've done lately, Michelle, is to look at the excess geothermal field steam and move them to green hydrogen. So we are working with a number of various companies to convert our steam, run various electrolyzers that some concessionaire company is working on to move to green hydrogen, move green hydrogen to green ammonia and therefore be able to commoditize power and transport it to other markets, but more importantly, take it to a green fertilizer. Being an agricultural economy, we have signed an off-tech agreement with a company that is developing green ammonia, and that is great for us. More importantly, I think we'll talk more to critical minerals and how we need to add value through our open access on transmission, through ensuring that we do collaborate and work with our neighboring countries where there are green minerals to be able to convert them and ensure that they go to market as process minerals. Thank you. Thank you very much, Davis. I look very much forward to homecoming and see all these green hydrogen developments in May this year. Tarek Amola, a minister of Egypt, you're next. You hosted an excellent COP in 27, the COP 27 two years ago, and finance was at the heart of this COP with the laws and damage fund, with the transparency of the financial institutions, and many other important developments. So we've taken a leadership role on finance. And what can we learn from that, also from your own domestic experiences with low emission hydrogen and other developments? The floor is yours. Thank you, Michel, and it's a good opportunity to talk about Egypt being an African country and how we did while hosting COP 27. I just wanted to thank also Dr. Amania Bouzid, the commissioner for energy for Africa. I would not going to repeat what she said, but we reiterate the importance of finance and concessionary finance for clean energies and the needs to, I would say, mobilize this kind of important financing. So being an African country, as you said, we recognize, of course, the importance of the climate action and we have urged the unified African voice and therefore during COP 27, in Charmes-Sheikh two years ago, we have been able really to represent our African continent, African brothers, African countries, achieving good outcomes for relevant African countries, especially for the loss and damage fund. And this was for the first time ever. Actually, also we acknowledge the critical need for the work toward enhancing the collective and urgent action to address the challenge of climate change. As you know, in Egypt, like all other African countries, and perhaps, Michel, you have stated that at the beginning that we could be the light powerhouse for the world as Africa. So I think we have huge potential for renewable energy. The Egyptian government actually had continued to lead the economic reform and drive the country's effort toward green energy, improving the investment climate, supporting the private sector and promoting clean energy projects. And I think that among the audience here, there are several countries and different private companies that have already signed several framework agreements for green hydrogen and low-carbon hydrogen to be built in Egypt. And we are progressing together with them. We are working on all energy sources. We are focusing on reducing emissions and providing energy in more environmentally responsible ways. And we have also to say that at the same time, we need to have and to allow the development also of some investments in hydrocarbons that will continue to be part of our global energy mix to support intermittent renewables. And this is something that we cannot ignore. We in Egypt, we have really updated our indices last year in order to reflect an ambitious plan of a target of 42% by the year 2035. And we have, for the first time in the region, Egypt has issued the first sovereign green bond to finance projects in clean transportation and sustainable water management. We have also ambitious targets for low-carbon hydrogen production to capitalize on unique assets of strategic location and low-cost renewables. Therefore, we talk about concessional financing, which is key to unlock not only Egypt's full potential, but Africa's full potential for renewable energy. We need to ensure that Africa receives the fair share of global pledged climate finance to achieve a just and balanced energy transition and, of course, therefore, the international financial institutions has critical role, including multilateral global banks in order to avail concessional finance to the risk investments. Africa still needs financial support to decarbonize its energy sources, including the low-carbon gas and LNG, energy efficiency, which are very efficient on that, methane abatement and CCUS applications. So we, as African countries, Egypt and all developing countries, cannot alone provide significant investment needed to achieve decarbonization and energy transition. And therefore, we are calling for the need of urgent more finance to push and to accelerate such projects. Private capital also is important to unlock these large investments for energy transitions at scale. Thank you. Thank you very much. Very good to hear both the concessional finance part, but also the green bond that you issued yourself. Very interesting combination of really important developments. Thank you for sharing these developments. Antoine Dion, the floor is yours. Minister of Energy from Senegal. Senegal has a large amount of natural gas resources that you are using also for the local population. And as a transitory fuel in the energy system, it plays a very important role. And can you tell us something about how you see what you have learned on natural gas also for the future for also other developments? Antoine, the floor is yours. Thank you. Thank you for having given me the floor. And I certainly thank you for this warmly. The nevertheless for having given us this opportunity at this meeting to exchange views and to share our opinions on this subject. Let me start by specifying that for us renewable energies constitute a marvelous opportunity. It really is an opportunity to transform our economy and to improve the living conditions of the population of Senegal. And so we have really made a qualitative leap forward over the last few years in this regard. In 2012, we had only 8% of our installed energy production coming from renewables, and now we've increased that to 31%. So if we look at the share of renewable energy and the total electricity production, we have 124 megawatts of renewable out of a thousand and some in total. So it's a really a leap forward. And so we have 11 renewable power plants. Ten of them are solar. One is Eolian. Now, of course, in January last year, 23, we signed a significant agreement with a number of international partners, including Canada, the United Kingdom, France, the European Union, and Germany. And what does this agreement state? The agreement foresees, among other objectives, that we are to reach a percentage of 40%, 40% by 2030. That's one of the objectives. But another one that is very much linked into the question that you have put about natural gas in Senegal. Today, gas is considered to be a transition source of energy for our country. First of all, because it's much less polluting than oil, but it also offers various other opportunities. First of all, gas to power will be using gas to generate electricity with conversion of existing power plants that have been burning diesel fuel so far. And Senegal has already taken the decision no longer to use coal. So that's the first objective, gas to electricity, gas to power. The second one is gas to industry, because in addition to the natural gas fields, we want to develop electricity cities whose objective it will be to produce fertilizer that will substantially improve the productivity of our farmers, of our cultivators. And so we are working with Mauritania and also in the gas fields of Jakar and Taraka. We want to achieve those two objectives. So yes, renewable energy, that's developing very well with both solar and wind powered electricity generation, but also gas for direct development of industry and gas to generate electricity. And we're also doing a lot of research on hydrogen with some pre-feasibility studies being carried out with a view substantially to reduce the CO2 emissions in my country. Thank you for your attention. Thank you very much for sharing this with us. That brings us to the second part of our round table. We've now heard speakers from the African continent and we now like to hear from speakers that like to partner up with their African partners to hear also from them. And first, I'd like to give the floor to Cadre Simpson, energy commissioner of the European Commission. And of course, Cadre, the European Union will be a large energy importer for the very long future. So in a sense, Europe benefits from cheap energy. But at the same time, there's the goal, of course, of helping our African partners for development, which would mean you could pay a little bit more for the energy. So how do you see the two objectives coming together, import of energy for Europe and development in Africa? Cadre, the floor is yours. Thank you and let me first start by thanking IAA, the Netherlands and the African Union for organizing this panel. And from the very start of the European Commission mandate, Commission led by Ursula van der Leyen, we made our partnership with Africa a priority. And actually our first college to college meeting took place in Africa. We were meeting with our colleagues from African Union. And since COP28, 132 countries joined our global pledge, initiated together with the European Commission, but supported by IRENA and International Energy Agency to triple renewables by 2030, and double energy efficiency improvements. This is clear that we see that this partnership, and the partnership especially in the energy sector, where we are ramping up collaboration of renewables and energy efficiency, is even more important. And what's clear from this is that Europe will look to broaden and deepen its partnerships, including this Africa to meet its own targets, but also encourage global decarbonisation. And in turn, yes, we will continue to support the continent as it strives to develop resilient and sustainable energy markets and build its energy autonomy long-term. And for us, this collaboration has several key aspects. As Dr. Abosaid already mentioned, we are working together to create a single electricity market, an African single electricity market. And this is something that we really appreciate, that in Europe we do have a well-interconnected electricity market that allows us to accommodate more renewables and avoid disruptions. So we want to share our knowledge with our neighbours. But one important avenue of collaboration is also renewable hydrogen. And we aim to make Africa a world champion in hydrogen exports. And there's strategic partnerships of renewable hydrogen and sustainable critical raw materials between us and some of our key partner countries are very good examples already. So we are working together with our partners to develop supply change for private and public investments and make it easier to do business. But it is a two-way street. The goal is indeed to export some of the green hydrogen to Europe to support our industry to decarbonise. But it also fosters skills and great jobs in our partner country. And more broadly, we are developing roots-based international hydrogen market. And we do have a new establishment, European Hydrogen Bank, that will work as a financing facility to further develop domestic and global markets for renewable hydrogen. And however, any development of renewable hydrogen production for export is not that expensive, supporting reliable and affordable energy access for the local population. And the Africa, the Ukraine Energy Initiative, it is currently packed by 20 billion euros, is expanding renewable energy capacity and providing millions with access to green electricity by 2030. And we are delivering this through a Team Europe approach. The EU institutions also are developing development and financing institutions together with great support of member states and this is backing the scale of 20 billion euros. And the last comment is about the CHAS Transition. Across Europe, we do have many regions who are impacted by the transition, more than others. And the CHAS Energy Transition Partnership launched within the G7 framework with South Africa in 2021 and more recently with Senegal, 23. This is also supporting sector reforms and strategic investments, but it is backed with dedicated financing. Thank you. Thank you very much, Kadri. And I'd now like to turn to Kyo Tsuji, State Minister of Foreign Affairs from Japan. And Japan has a long tradition of long-term contracts on critical materials. So the similar question to you, how do you see the double goal of trading critical materials at cheap prices and at the same time fostering sustainable development in Africa? Floor chores. Here you go. Thank you, Michelle. I'd also like to commend the Netherlands and the IEA as well as the EU for bringing us together today. I think I should even repeat myself on how important Africa is in its role in global clean energy transitions. But to make this happen, I believe two things are goal. One is socially and environmentally sustainable approach. Is the key in tapping into this opportunity? And another is capacity building. And in that sense, Japan, to give an example, has been cooperating with Africa through the Tokyo International Conference on Africa Development. We call it TCAD for more than 30 years. And our belief is that Japan should cooperate to facilitate Africa's own lead development and green growth, including energy transitions under the Green Growth Initiative with Africa. And in addition to enhancing green growth, we believe that Africa has a great potential to be an exporter of clean energy, as well as critical minerals. And I believe it's Japan's belief when we do over disease assistance is that Africa should be in control of their own minerals, of what they have. And again, socially and environmentally sustainable approach, what we call it is instrumental. And in establishing this, we'd like to go in between the private public sectors and try to promote good governments and economic benefit too. This is the key too. We want to provide jobs. We want to benefit local workers and communities. And such an approach will contribute ultimately to reducing project risks and attracting more sound investment. See, Japan, it's our belief that even if our private firms in the short term do not get the longer end of the stick, ultimately, if we support our country, Africa, in the long term, we will benefit from that. So when we do these development aids, we make sure there are no hidden agendas. We don't weaponize our tools. No manipulation, like some states do. We just can't do that. I think I don't want to sound too naive, but integrity is the key in providing support. And of course our firms will benefit in the long run, but even if they don't in the short run, I think ultimately if the global, it's much more than what Japan needs. It's what the global society wants. And we're in support of strengthening the value chains of clean energy manufacturing as a whole. And I believe that the IEA can play a role in helping African partners in promoting this application of environmentally and socially sustainable approach in critical minerals. And we, of course, as Japan will support the IEA on working on this ultimate goal. And to conclude, I'd like to just say that clean energy transitions will create opportunities for Africa, in Africa, and eventually by Africa. I don't want to sound like a former American president, but I really believe so. And we will continue to cooperate with Africa to tap into the potential to promote sustainable development in collaboration with the international partners, including the IEA. Thank you. Thank you very much. Integrity is the key to support a very good line, an important principle. We now turn to the international institutions. May I please ask you to be succinct, as we're already running slightly out of time. And first, I'd like to give the floor to Damirola Ogunbiji, the special representative of the UN Secretary General. Sustainable energy for all and co-chair of the UN Energy. Thank you, moderator. Your excellencies, distinguished leaders. In the last decade or so, developing countries have received relatively low when it comes to global investments linked to renewable energy. Just to give you an example, Sub-Saharan Africa, for example, has received less than 1.5% of the amount of investments globally in the last 20 years. I believe all of us in this room know that low energy cannot mean great economic growth. So it's important to show with the data that IEA puts out why people are lagging behind. This figure is simply unacceptable in African countries because African countries want to grow at the rate of developing countries as well. To ensure that emerging markets in developing countries, especially those in Africa, realize their clean energy potential, they need to take advantages of the opportunities that currently are faced in developing countries. And when we talk about the need for transition, I think it's important to put it in context. Minister from the AU said, when you are still in a continent where 600 million people have no access to electricity at all, so they will never watch what we are doing here today, and we have 900 million people do not have access to clean cooking, and clean cooking is the fifth largest cause of an African woman. You can understand that it's not just a climate crisis, it's a health crisis, and it's a whole of economy crisis that we're dealing with. However, and I'm really thankful for the ministers here today, there is some bright light. And I think it's important to understand that that's what we're doing today in terms of climate positivity, not just because we are focusing on using it more efficiently because there's not enough to use, but we're also focusing how does it drive economic growth. So I'm just going to talk about two points since I have one minute left of which is critical to really make these drives. So the adoptions of policies and incentives everyone talks about, you have to have a policy regime that works, and I completely agree. I worked in the Nigerian government for many years, and I worked in a situation when people said solar dust doesn't work, and we had to show solar projects. So thanks to the German government at the time, the EU at the time who actually believed in doing projects, and that's when Nigeria decided that 30% of the energy mix will be from renewables. The other thing that is very, very critical for this working is to make sure there's access to renewables actually in country. We're working on the renewable energy system. Currently it takes between six to nine months to bring lithium batteries into continent. You can't ask a country to stop what it's doing for that timeframe to bring these in. So as our colleagues, and we heard from Japan, these are technologies you could actually bring in. Secondly, everyone talks about increased level of investment, but nothing happens without funding. It just doesn't. Either bilateral agreements like the Netherlands has with solar system manufacturing, Germany is heavily investing through GIZ, and then Italy is also looking at the policy environment. All these things really, really do add up, but there needs to be a key focus on how to fund African energy and African renewable energy systems. Thank you. Thank you very much. Good examples of what is happening and what is needed. Let me now turn and to Franz Dresgros, the director, regional director from the World Bank Group, and he joins us virtually. So let's see if the system works. Yes, thank you so much. It works. Thank you so much. Thank you to the Netherlands. So let me give you a very concrete example of what that means. I'm connecting you from Nigeria. Nigeria is the country with the single biggest access deficit on the planet. 85 million Nigerians don't have electricity today. In December, the World Bank approved the law for the first time in the last five years. And it's been a long time since the last time we had electricity. We had $750 million that will leverage $1 billion in private investment and bring electricity to 17 million of those 85 million people. That's 25% or 20% of Nigeria's access deficit. That's a huge shutdown, but I think it's just the beginning. We'd like to do much more. We'd like to bring power to 100 million people by 2030 and to do that, we need a successful replenishment of our IDA fund for the forest, which is being recapitalized this year. And let me say, since some of previous speakers have talked about green hydrogen exports, if governments urge voids and taxes for those green hydrogen projects, they can, of course, steer that money to programs like the one in Nigeria, to generate even more private investment and even more people with access. So thank you very much and back to you. Thank you very much, Franz, for joining virtually with us today. Now we go to some speakers of the private sector. We're also some other examples of good practices. And the first is Siegfried Hugemann of the African Hydrogen Partnership. Siegfried, the floor is yours. Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Dear ladies and gentlemen, thank you for having me here today. My name is Siegfried Hugemann and I'm the Secretary General of the only continent-wide African Association dedicated to green and natural hydrogen. So please allow me to share good news with all of you. The large-scale commercialization of green hydrogen has effectively already started in Africa. So with a project in Namibia, Baseload Renewable Power, that basically allows to provide a continuous baseload using hydrogen storage technology. I think that is a very encouraging development. The construction work is supposed to start this year. Another good news is we started the African Hydrogen Partnership at the end of 2020 and started taking in new members in March 2021 and the leadership team of the African Hydrogen Partnership managed to make this organization profitable, although we are non-profits, so let's call it a surplus, financial surplus, literally within two and a half years. That is another very encouraging sign. So what do we focus on primarily is the development of the domestic markets. Export, of course, is important, but we see more greater opportunities on the domestic side of things. And here, please allow me to mention the heart to obeyed sectors with a strong focus on where is hydrogen basically unavoidable, where are the sectors where we do not have to compete basically with battery technology and so on and so forth. I guess all of you guys have heard about decarbonizing the shipping industry, green fertilizer, baseload renewable power, etc. So that is what we are focusing on. That allows us to bring developers and off-takers together that can work in a cash market environment that does not require hugely subsidized financial derivatives markets, which is important as well. Last but not least, our philosophy is based on the fact that consume the hydrogen where it is produced in order to keep the cost low. So it's a bit early to speak about any specific details, but we are working now on various initiatives where we already know those initiatives are potentially feasible, but the challenges there are more so on the political side of things. Another important aspect is the electric grid. We have heard about Nigeria, for example, so there is a power generation and then the electric grid, but that offers tremendous opportunities as well. Nigeria has a total power generation capacity coming from diesel generators of more than 40 gigawatt and kilowatt-hour can cost 50 US dollar cents plus. That is a tremendous opportunity for hydrogen because hydrogen offers the flexibility that is needed. So I believe that green hydrogen and natural hydrogen has a great future in Africa. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Siegfried. And we now heard a lot about finance, about solar installations, but there is also a grid but there is also other infrastructure needed. So I think that about a few months of the port of Rotterdam can you shed some light on infrastructure, poor infrastructure, storage, et cetera. Yes, thank you, Michel. Without transport, no supply chain, without storage, no buildup of cargo for further transportation. The Dutch government and the port of Rotterdam were closely together in energy diplomacy all around the world. We believe the hydrogen economy can yield great benefits for both producers and buyers. We're all facing the same challenge worldwide to transition our energy system from fossil to renewable. We have built strong connections with countries on the African continent like Morocco, Namibia, Egypt, South Africa and others. Feedback from all these connections shows we can specifically as a port contribute by sharing knowledge to further unlock and develop ports with industrial areas. It's not just a matter of expertise for the outbuilding of ports. For these kind of projects we can bring in our maritime and industrial networks and of course our own expertise as a port development company with technical, nautical as well as commercial expertise and knowledge of the optimal clustering of industries. We expressly do not just connect ourselves with projects. We also involve experienced parties from our port community that are looking to invest. We also work closely together with other Dutch state-owned companies like Invest International and the Dutch Gas Union. It is important these developments primarily offer benefits at the local level. Think of the availability of desalinated water and bringing renewable energy to scale that will lead to lower prices. Another important aspect aside from the local development will be establishing corridors between producers and off-takers. This is to offer more security to supply and demand also within the African continent itself and Rotterdam can support in this matchmaking. We can take care of the required infrastructure help parties throughout the supply chain to get organized. Our port community members are already preparing themselves for these kind of developments. It is my pleasure to give the floor over to my neighbour who will speak further to this. Thank you very much. Thank you Bader Wein. Then I indeed give Tobias Bischoff names immediately the floor to tell us more. Thank you very much. Thanks a lot for the invitation. Happy to talk about what we do in Namibia. Tobias Bischoff names my name I'm a board member at ENATRAC. We are one of the largest and one of our projects globally that we develop is the hyphen project in Namibia. A few key facts by 2030 we aim to deploy 7 gigawatt of wind and renewable capacity 3 gigawatt electrolyzer capacity in order to produce up to 2 million tons of ammonia per year. In total after three build-out phases we will have 12 to 13 billion euros of investment deployed. Now what's special about this project and what's the status of this project out of the many, many announcements that sound I must admit quite similar to what I have just put down in numbers. First of all the project was the successful contender in a competitive procurement program that was not started by the EU, by Germany, by the World Bank or by any other international organization it was started out of a strategy that the Namibian government gave itself to develop the country as a competitive advantage that the country has, one of which being the production of green hydrogen. The commercial participation of the Namibian state in this project was part of that competitively tendered process. As a result the Namibian government as a true partner of us in the project is a 24% co-investor in the project and receives a total of 50 to 60% of the total value creation via dividends on the 24% tax, land rent, royalties which will all flow into a newly created sovereign wealth fund to foster sustainable economic development. Out of the tender a 40 year concession agreement was end negotiated and signed in May last year which can now be in our opinion blueprint for industrialization of countries on the back of green hydrogen. The co-benefits for Namibia vast 15,000 jobs during construction 2,000 to 3,000 permanent jobs the complete decarbonization of the electricity sector of Namibia due to the surplus electricity alone of a project of this magnitude water for the municipalities in the area from surplus water surplus electricity and hydrogen for the southern African power pool and new downstream industries. The opportunity for sustainable for African sustainable development I believe are there's the opportunity to build sustainable new green energy trade partnerships these new export opportunities can achieve long-term sustainable growth because they are quite different to what we know from oil and gas the main difference is the resource it's not a resource game it's a manufacturing game we are not talking about extracting a resource shipping it away and then it's gone like coal, oil, gas or diamonds or whatever the resource was the resource is wind and sun that doesn't go away we are manufacturing wind and sun the main issue is the bankability and with that the cost of capital related host countries like Namibia do a lot to address this but there's something that we need to address as well we need off-take certainty we need certainty around volumes certainty around prices that naturally cannot come from the host countries it must come from the off-take countries meaning the EU, Japan, South Korea with that we can achieve full industrialization of a country like Namibia within a generation thank you very much and when you talk about finance it's always good to hear an expert an expert in finance or bankers so over to you, Renzi Alvontoner at Standard Bank South Africa thank you thank you for the opportunity just briefly, Standard Bank is one of the biggest banks on the continent we are currently in 20 African countries also in some countries known as Stand Big Bank our presence is quite important for us we got local balance sheet that we do deploy a strong commitment in terms of renewables and green energy I think the key thing for us as a commercial bank just in unlocking the power sector and the commercial viability is absolutely around the enabling environment I think that's the one key point strong commitment from government policy certainty and how do you crowd in investors to be able to give you that comfort so that your projects are sustainable I think the second point that is important to raise is the commitment to be able to develop those projects and the very difficult circumstances and many project developer sponsors will complain that it take quite long to develop projects in Africa I think to a certain extent that is absolutely true one need to be open minded around the support around development capital so the partnerships between commercial banks DFIs are critical we find that blended finance solutions are very optimal in terms of supporting sponsors around bankability but at the same time we need DFIs to play the role that they should be playing we do fund on grit we funded off grit solutions I think in many cases we played the role of a local currency provider which I also think is a very important point to note we cannot continue to only look at hard currency solutions in many countries and I think if you look at our portfolio across some of the countries presented today we find that the sooner we develop those type of local currency solutions in funding larger scale projects the better I just want to conclude with giving you a good example of how successful one can be if you have a committed funder a committed developer we've closed and financed the project that is currently operational within three years we bet the project we reach financial close it's the largest project on the continent 540 megawatt of PV solar with 1.1 gigawatt hours of batteries storage and it is currently producing in Kennard in South Africa and I think it's a really good example of what can be done if you've got the right partner roughly in dollar terms $800 million we will sell financier and we distributed some of that debt within the first month after closing the project so I think one need to focus on some of these good stories and keep going, thank you thank you very much indeed focus on good examples we now come to the open round of discussions everybody has two minutes and I already know three speakers that asked for the floor first of all Minister Tine van Schratten of Belgium who also holds the rotating presidency of the European Union at the moment Tine thank you Michelin for organizing this and for all the speakers who gave their insights there are many speakers so maybe it's good to to bring the hook there it belongs in the introduction of Laura Cosi Africa is home to one out of five people in the world and yet 600 million of them lack access to electricity Africa has 60% of the best solar resources but only 3% of global energy investment is going to Africa so it's a little bizarre to hear that projects can only be bankable because of host countries how can we then organize clean energy to all and clean energy to Africa in general if we depend on host countries to make projects bankable and to export all of the energy produced in Africa so it is my firm belief that host countries do have a responsibility but their responsibility is to be Africa oriented and people oriented and clean energy for Africa first and then I also believe that we have to look for more innovative ways to work in partnership and how that we have done it before is maybe not fit for purpose anymore I think the example of APRA within Irina I think was inspired by the Nairobi Declaration is one of the examples that could serve us and it's maybe also someone said Damula will be a project strive policy and if you have this bottom up approach like in APRA that we can design our policies better and my last 10 seconds I'm going to use to funding we have been so bad in funding including in all the commitments and promises that we made in climate negotiations but we need reform of our multilateral institutions to better fund these projects otherwise clean cooking we will still be talking at the 100th anniversary of IEA Thank you Dina and now over to John Paolo Coutilou from the G7 presidency Thank you I want first of all to thank the Netherlands of course and the African Union for hosting this important meeting and thanks also to Laura for reminding that Africa is a key priority if not the priority for Italy also in the framework of our current G7 presidency we aim at promoting equitable partnership for a common sustainable growth and industrialization and in order to do that we need to address these challenges abiding by the principle of nothing about Africa without Africa since our Prime Minister launched the Mattei Plan for African at the recent Italy Africa Summit which was held in Rome which has energy as one of its main pillars a plan that will enhance Europe-Africa relations especially on sustainable energy and growth and will greatly feature the G7 work this year this brings me to today's discussions because the challenge for adjust and mutual growth in developing countries and African ones is of course intertwined with the fight against climate change the implementation of energy transition and the need to ensure a sustainable future for us all these dossiers are a priority for our leadership especially with regards to our initiatives in Africa we are already engaged in financing projects for climate mitigation for African countries through the newly established Italian Climate Fund which is predominantly devoted to African countries and of course in addition to our development cooperation furthermore we are also working to design initiatives to mobilize and pool resources including from the private sector and the civil society more specifically we are working on an initiative jointly developed by A&UNDP on enhancing energy access and growth in Africa through technical assistance and financing tools the idea is to launch a platform to boost green projects and investments in Africa focusing on transition agricultural projects so the platform would focus on addressing past and present international assistance in the energy sector discern best practices and identify existing gaps acting as a much needed link between projects seeking support and investments so we look forward to coordinate our efforts for building bridges and achieving and common success thank you thank you very much and also for your leadership in the G7 on these important issues Anna from Portugal and I see there are still a lot of people at the room because we have to vacate it at 2.30 so what we are going to do is I will see if I can give everybody one minute so think already ahead if you can be very very grievance to sing Anna, you first thank you very much let me start by congratulating the IEA for the report on financing clean energy in Africa we have translated it to Portugal and it is a very important report because on a very concrete issue regarding public finance for the sake of time it's an innovative mechanism that actually Portugal developed together with Cape Verde it's a debt swap what we do is we convert public debt of Cape Verde vis-à-vis Portugal we convert it into a climate fund that Cape Verde can use to finance green projects in Cape Verde selected by Cape Verde this is very important because it benefits not only the country but as Amina rightly said before it actually benefits us all and that's the purpose that's what's driving Portugal into this path we started with 30 million euros we can enlarge it up to 140 the full amount of public debt we have enlarged it to other countries and basically the coal year would be for these for other creditors countries that in this way can actually foster the clean transition in Africa thank you thank you very much very good initiative then I start with EBRD one minute thank you and I want to pick up the point about the need to the risk and bring down the cost of capital and first of all I really wanted to thank the IEA for doing just that for doing it by providing really excellent data and analysis that is really important actually on the project level itself and we use that data very much when we make our financing decisions for example we financed and advised the development of the Benban Solar Park in Egypt the largest solar park on the continent and we very much look forward to furthering our cooperation and our partnership as we also gradually expand to sub-Saharan Africa thank you thank you very much also for being so succinct my colleague from Switzerland one of the key challenge to have bankable projects is the quality of the projects and I would like to draw your attention on a new initiative called Blue Dot Network which is a certification process that incentivize quality infrastructure investment and the Blue Dot Network will be hosted at the OECD and its pilot phase launched in April this year and this could help also to close or to reuse the gap for financing new projects thank you thank you very much for this contribution thank you very much and I'd like to thank the IEA for the invitation as well I would just like to pick up on the point made by several of our colleagues here including Demi Lola and also colleague from Belgium about the importance of thinking about renewables in clean cooking for Africa which it's good to hear that there are more and more people around this table who are talking about this important topic and the importance of more research policy and funding needed for this area I work for Coco Networks which now sells sustainably produced bioethanol for cooking fuel to over 1.2 million households around East Africa and there are more companies other than just us putting development capital and research into more and more innovations into looking for renewable solutions for clean cooking and I just wanted to add a profile of this important innovation thank you so much thank you many mentioned the importance of clean cooking and it will be in May a whole summit devoted to clean cooking here at the IEA that brings us to next speaker IEA yes the international high power association many thanks for this important forum and good discussion but that does seem to be from between the discussion and the data we need to talk about hydropower I mean the hydropower provides the vast majority of decarbonised electricity in the continent at the moment it provides the balance provides flexibility provides storage many of the issues that has been discussed as challenges around the table and what's more it's around 90% untapped within Africa the potential is there and that's not even starting on the potential for pumped storage hydropower off river options but as many people around the table have said of course it needs de-risking and I'll just say there are lots of examples around the world about how this is being done IEA is very happy to work with governments to help deliver to give those examples as governments do plan that and I would say the sector is ready Thank you very much Thank you very much Global Renewables Alliance with a single voice for the renewables industry internationally first I'd like to express our huge gratitude to all the governments in the room who signed the pledge of tripling renewables leading up to COP28 and supporting the agreement in the final GST text particularly the beginning of the renewables century specifically the leadership of the Kenyan government Mr. Chichir and your president Ruto he went as far to say tripling is not enough we need to do five times in the African continent so I celebrate that support of the European Commission was instrumental and also your support in getting that tripling pledge agreed of course now and action and we work with our colleagues at the IEA Paolo and his team on the renewables tracker to monitor and report the progress annually up to 2030 I think that's critical and secondly on accountability sorry on action two things one is permit sorry I have to look at the time but we really like your contribution and the importance of monitoring the tripling EITI thank you chair and surely one minute is not too short to focus on the collective challenge that we face of strengthening governance to underpin the renewables sector energy sectors growth from 20 years of experience in raising standards of governance across extractives we have seen that transparency and multi stakeholder dialogue can be a means of building trust and bringing a really wide range of voices into policymaking almost half of countries implementing the ITI standard are in Africa among them Senegal which has made very significant progress building on opportunities in the gas sector so it's clear that the African continent cannot miss out on the opportunity to convert massive capital investment into sustainable economic growth however there is a global a growing challenge globally relating to corruption and community opposition and the renewable sector I would argue is not immune to this it risks undermining societal acceptance of renewables and slowing investment transparency matters from mineral supply chains which also fuel growth of renewables so to conclude governance and collective action should be seen as an enabler to the renewable sector rather than as an obstacle to growth thank you indeed that brings us to the final speaker of today from renewables 21 thank you very much and congratulations I will not speak very much about the congratulations now to have more time and observation coming from multi stakeholder policy network but also somebody involved in renewable energy since many times there are some facts we hear with the same voices with the same metrics with the same facts since many years I don't think that anybody here in the room can we cannot allow ourselves that we find ourselves in 15 years back and we look back and things have not moved but there is such a risk I would like to underline one thing where transparency I think is important multi stakeholders important we look at the same thing it's renewable anti sources on the African continent but we look from different perspectives to build new partnerships probably with a joint agreement on key performance indicators that take into account local benefits regional benefits, continental benefits and global benefits thank you thank you very much and that is almost a perfect summary of all the things in this discussion sorry for running a little bit out of time but it gave us the opportunity to hear as many voices as possible around this table in the discussion I'm not going to summarize everything but we heard of a grand vision of Africa's the powerhouse of the world the many opportunities that it gave some concrete examples that we've seen in some of the ministers gave us from the African continent and also some of the challenges and ways how to overcome it from finance to infrastructure to local co-benefits to good governance so thank you all for your attention and I'll see you towards a brighter future thank you all