The African Development Bank (AfDB) Group is expected to unveil its new agenda for the continent\u2019s economic transformation at this year\u2019s Annual Meetings which start today in Lusaka, Zambia.<\/p>\n
In an Annual Meetings preview video message, AfDB President Akinwumi Adesina, who will be presiding over his first Annual Meetings since assuming office as the bank\u2019s 8th president on September 1, 2015, said that participants will examine a host of burning issues in Africa as well as focus on the bank\u2019s five new priority actions \u2013 the High 5s \u2013 designed to scale up its operations for the continent\u2019s transformation.<\/p>\n
The five priorities include Light up and power Africa, Feed Africa, Industrialise Africa, Integrate Africa, and Improve the quality of life for the people of Africa.<\/p>\n
\u201cEach of those is high on the agenda in Lusaka,\u201d Adesina said, noting that three of them will take a quantum leap forward as the bank unveils new strategies, and a programme to create 25 million jobs for young people over the next decade.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll of them need to be debated and owned, as much by governments, as by business, as by civil society, as by the press, as by the people of Africa. The agenda is huge: We want to see nothing less than the social and economic transformation of Africa. We want to unleash massive potential \u2013 for Africa and for the world,\u201d he emphasised.<\/p>\n
A central theme of the discussion will be energy, considered to be the continent\u2019s Achilles\u2019 heel and the central theme of the Annual Meetings \u2013\u2018Energy and Climate Change.\u2019 This topmost priority of the<\/p>\n
High 5s speaks to the bank\u2019s determination to tackle the severe energy deficit in the continent where 650 million people don\u2019t have access to electricity.<\/p>\n
Governors, usually Finance or Economy Ministers, representing the 54 African and 26 non-Africa member countries of the bank group will review its 2015 operations report and approve its activities and budget for the coming year. In 2015, the bank Group made loans and grants of $8.8 billion, a 25 percent increase on 2014.<\/p>\n
During the high-level meetings and thematic forums, participants will make in-depth assessments of the performance of Africa countries in the past year and envision how the Bank can help them cope with the difficult economic situation they face due to the global economic downturn and the fall in commodity prices.<\/p>\n
Despite the prevailing \u201ceconomic headwinds\u201d, the continent has demonstrated extraordinary resilience, posting growth rates of four percent, a percentage point higher than the global average and even higher in some countries in 2015, Adesina said.<\/p>\n
Several heads of state are expected to attend the meetings, the bank\u2019s flagship event that is expected to bring together some 3,000 delegates. Other invitees include development partners, representatives of international organizations, academia, civil society and the media.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Annual Meetings are the bank\u2019s window on the world. They showcase its operational work; its knowledge work; its advocacy work; and it\u2019s convening power,\u201d Adesina said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The African Development Bank (AfDB) Group is expected to unveil its new agenda for the continent\u2019s economic transformation at this year\u2019s Annual Meetings which start today in Lusaka, Zambia. In an Annual Meetings preview video message, AfDB President Akinwumi Adesina, who will be presiding over his first Annual Meetings since assuming office as the bank\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":24780,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24774","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24774","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24774"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24774\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24781,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24774\/revisions\/24781"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24774"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24774"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.times.mw\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24774"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}