Africa’s Resilience “Cornerstone of Global Financial Stability”
Communiqué of the GCA High-Level Dinner Dialogue: Resilient Economies – Africa
Spring Meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank Group, Washington, DC
O
n the margins of the 2025 International Monetary Fund (IMF)–World Bank Spring Meetings, the Global Center on Adaptation (GCA), together with the Governments of Kenya and Norway and the African Development Bank (AfDB), convened a High-Level Dinner Dialogue with 30 participants spanning African governments, international financial institutions and development partners under the theme “Resilient Economies – Africa.” The Dialogue gathered Ministers of Finance and Economy and Environment, leaders of international financial institutions, and key development partners for a strategic discussion on bolstering Africa’s economic resilience in a rapidly changing global context.
Held at a decisive moment of rising global economic uncertainty, geopolitical flux, and compounding crises—from climate shocks to debt vulnerabilities—the dialogue recognized that Africa stands at the epicenter of both challenge and opportunity. The continent’s economic potential is immense, but so are the pressures of food and energy insecurity, demographics, digital transformation, and constrained financing. In this context, building resilient economies in Africa is not only a regional imperative but will increasingly represent a cornerstone of global financial stability, climate having become an important macro-critical concern for Africa and the world. Accelerating the transformation towards resilient economies in Africa was therefore a major concern for the world economy and Bretton Woods institutions, and a key priority for African economies and regional organizations and programs.
Key Consensus and Outcomes:
1. Urgent Imperative for Accelerated Adaptation in Africa
Participants agreed that the economic future of the world’s most climate-vulnerable continent hinges on rapidly scaling up resilience and adaptation efforts. There was broad consensus on the urgent need to ensure that adaptation remains central within global and regional development finance agendas. In particular, participants called for the expansion of mechanisms such as the IMF’s Resilience and Sustainability Facility (RSF) and the Africa Adaptation Acceleration Program (AAAP), jointly implemented by the GCA together with AfDB and the African Union Commission, in addition to other partners, as well as for protecting debt-sustainable climate and environmental financing through the Green Climate Fund and other established channels. Enhancing domestic adaptation finance mobilization was critical for scaling up adaptation action across Africa, as is full delivery of the doubling of international adaptation finance by developed countries by the end of 2025.
2. Africa as a Cradle of Adaptation Solutions
There was a strong and unified vision from high-level representatives from Africa that the continent must leverage its unique strengths and harness the economic dividends of adaptation to drive climate-smart sustainable development, inclusive growth, and job creation. Participants reiterated that Africa’s proactive adaptation leadership can serve as a model globally, contributing not only to local resilience but also to broader global economic stability, including through South-South and North-South exchanges. Innovation is critical to success in building a resilient economy in Africa and it is vital that financing enables the scaling of innovation, such as those pioneered by CGIAR in the agricultural sector.
3. Youth Dividend and Entrepreneurship
Participants were mindful that Africa is the most youthful continent in the world and that generating job creation and work for the large-scale and growing working age population of youth was a major preoccupation for African economies. In this context, adaptation finance can serve to help unlock new opportunities for entrepreneurship that assist African economies to capture the continent’s youth dividend. Adaptation action and its financing should carefully consider the extent to which their high contribution potential to job creation and the fostering of entrepreneurship can be leveraged for maximum synergy and impact.
4. Demonstrated Impact of Resilience Initiatives (IMF RSF, AAAP)
Adaptation and resilience programs are delivering in Africa and creating demonstrated impact. The IMF RSF has already approved arrangements for at least 13 African countries, with total approved financing amounting to approximately SDR 5.8 billion (about US$7.7 billion). The AAAP has successfully mainstreamed climate adaptation solutions into over $16 billion in development investments across some 100 projects in 40 African countries. As the program approaches its initial $25 billion goal by end-2025, participants underscored the urgency of doubling down on its delivery and success, reaffirming the program’s role as the largest adaptation finance initiative in the world. Thanks to the IMF RSF, AAAP and further regional initiatives, major new development investments into critical infrastructure, agricultural projects and public services across Africa will continue to deliver benefits for tens of millions of climate vulnerable people despite more severe future climate and weather conditions, while national resilient policy development and institutional capabilities have also been scaled up.
5. Towards AAAP 2.0: Scaling Ambition Amidst New Realities
Recognizing unfortunately increased constraints for the international climate and development finance landscape, leaders voiced strong support for the next phase of AAAP (2026–2030), and endorsed African calls to raise its ambition to $50 billion. AAAP 2.0 aims to strengthen the country ownership model and there was a shared commitment to enhance private sector participation, especially through collaboration with African commercial banks and innovative instruments such as resilience bonds. AAAP 2.0 should step up the role of the program towards promoting systemic transformation, focusing on scalability and replicability. The need to ensure value for money in adaptation investments in the future continues to grow, and therefore it is vital that the design of AAAP 2.0 be informed by independent evaluations that focus on assessing value for money impact.
Next Steps:
The Dialogue reaffirmed the need to elevate resilience in economic policymaking and development finance and highlighted key upcoming milestones including the AfDB Annual Meetings in Ivory Coast in May 2025, the South Africa G20 presidency and Summit, the 2nd Africa Climate Summit being hosted by Ethiopia in September 2025, the UN General Assembly, and culminating at UNFCCC COP30 in Belém, Brazil. Continued alignment and partnership among African leaders, international financial institutions, and development partners will be essential to achieving these shared goals. The event likewise highlighted that the newly established dual headquarters of the GCA being established in Nairobi, Kenya, was an opportunity to consolidate Africa’s resilience journey and cement its role as a leader in climate solutions. Development partners and international financial institutions participating in the Dialogue reaffirmed their support to African nations in pursuing climate resilient development with the support of AAAP, the IMF RSF and other financing and assistance programs.
*The Communique was issued in the format of a non-attributed Chair’s summary issued by the Global Center on Adaptation on behalf of fellow co-convenors Kenya, Norway, and the African Development Bank for this invitation-only, closed door high-level dialogue event.
