Published on: 2026-05-12
Source: United Nations – United Nations –
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By 2040, Africa will be capable of producing 10 times more electricity than it needs itself, exclusively from renewable sources, yet 600 million people on the continent still live without power. This was stated by UN Secretary-General António Guterres at the ongoing “Africa Ahead” summit in Nairobi. The meeting was organized jointly by France and Kenya.
Guterres emphasized that today African countries are actively participating in one of the main contemporary discourses – about the reform of the global financial architecture, which was created in 1945 – “for a world that no longer exists.” According to him, it is precisely African states that are creating such tools as the Borrowers’ Platform, so that debtor countries can “conduct negotiations from a position of strength.”
The continent is actively fighting against an unfair credit rating system and promoting a UN framework convention on international tax cooperation.
Guterres added that international financial institutions make decisions without the participation of the countries whose economies they shape. At the same time, budgets allocated for aid are being reduced, and obligations are not being fulfilled.
“This is not only a financing crisis. This is a crisis of solidarity,” said the UN chief.
The Secretary-General paid special attention to climate justice. The African continent suffers from the most serious consequences of global warming, although it is not one of the main perpetrators of climate change. African countries possess 60 percent of the planet’s “solar potential,” but receive only 2 percent of global investments in clean energy. Because many families cannot cook using ecological methods, 800,000 people die annually in Africa, mostly women and children.
At the same time, the cost of borrowing for African countries is twice as high as that for countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
Guterres also called to end the long-standing practice of exploiting resources: “The ‘green transition’ requires enormous amounts of minerals, with which Africa is rich, and the countries of the continent must benefit from their extraction.”
“The benefit from Africa’s resources should primarily and to the greatest extent be received by the people in Africa,” said the Secretary-General.
A partnership of the continent with the world, according to the UN Secretary-General, should be built on equality. This means not just investments, but joint ownership of industries, support for African universities, and the development of artificial intelligence based on African data and languages.
He emphasized that Africa’s success is the success of the whole world, considering the continent’s demographic scale: “By 2050, every fourth person on the planet will be African.”
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