“Africa must depend less on the rest of the world for vaccines”

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Akinwumi Adesina, President of the African Development Bank, in Abidjan, in January 2020.

While the health crisis has intensified in recent weeks in several African countries, the president of the African Development Bank (AfDB), Akinwumi Adesina, is worried in an interview with World Africa to see the problems of access to vaccines against Covid-19 and the burden of debt prolong the economic difficulties on the continent.

The day after the annual meetings of his institution, from June 23 to 25, the Nigerian affirms that the Pan-African bank is best placed to manage the “special drawing rights”, these resources of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) which African countries hope benefit up to 100 billion dollars (about 84 billion euros) to overcome the crisis.

After a recession in 2020, the AfDB expects growth to return to Africa this year. But the third epidemic wave that has been sweeping for several weeks in several countries of the continent does not make you fear a crisis longer than expected?

We continue to hope that Africa will experience a recovery in 2021 and we expect growth of 3.2%. But the realization of this forecast depends on two things.

The first, very important, is access to vaccines. Without this, we cannot envisage, for example, restarting tourism. African countries that depend on this sector have seen their growth rate drop by an average of 11.5% in 2020. We estimate that it could grow by 6.2% this year, but that will only happen if people are vaccinated. This is the case for barely 1% of the African population today, while developed countries have used almost all available vaccines for them.

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The second risk is debt and how it will be managed. This one is too heavy for many countries. The amount of external debt in Africa amounts to 842 billion dollars. And what is more complicated is that 40% of this debt is owed to private and commercial creditors. This burden risks hampering the recovery: you cannot go up the slope when you have a bag of cement on your back.

You recently stated that “Africa should not beg for vaccines”. But how to respond to the urgency of the health crisis?

Today, vaccine deliveries to Africa are too slow, too low, and often the price is wrong. If we do not resolve this problem very quickly, the virus could start to circulate on the continent in a more virulent way.

To meet this challenge, we must depend less on the rest of the world and develop a continental strategy. In the immediate term, we must give incentives to companies manufacturing vaccines so that they set up in Africa and produce locally. Next, we want to support local pharmaceutical companies to increase their capacities and enable them to produce vaccines themselves.

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In the medium and long terms, we must also invest in the development of research so that there is more exchange between Africa and the developed countries in the field of biomedical sciences. And it is important to promote the creation of a biomedical agency in Africa in order to resolve the issue of the quality of vaccines and drugs.

With the global attention focused on Covid-19, do we not risk neglecting other essential public health themes for Africa, such as the fight against tuberculosis or malaria?

Each crisis should allow us to learn lessons for the future. Today, we see clearly that it is necessary to completely rebuild the African health systems, which are in a really degraded state. It is not acceptable to continue like this.

We want to encourage vaccine production and the development of a more efficient pharmaceutical sector, and it’s not just about Covid-19. It should also allow the development of vaccines and targeted treatments against other diseases that particularly affect Africa.

It is also necessary to improve the infrastructures devoted to care and health. Today, 51% of health centers in Africa have no running water and sanitation system, 33% do not have access to electricity. The AfDB is already investing a lot in transport, energy and digital infrastructure.

Regarding debt, how do you judge the responses developed by the international community, in particular the “common framework” adopted at the end of 2020 by the G20 to manage future debt restructuring in poor countries?

The “common framework” alone will not solve the problem. Because of Covid-19, countries have suffered a massive drop in their GDP. We estimate the financing needs for Africa at 485 billion dollars by 2030, including 245 billion dollars for low-income countries.

It is with these figures in mind that we must ask ourselves whether the efforts made so far for Africa are sufficient or not. Take, for example, the first debt suspension initiative, in which 38 African countries participated. It was only $ 4.5 billion and it was not about reducing the stock of debt, just postponing its repayment until later.

Read the editorial: Getting Africa out of the debt trap

The “common framework” is a good idea. But so far, only three African countries – Chad, Ethiopia and Zambia – have requested restructuring. And in the process, the rating agencies downgraded Ethiopia’s sovereign rating. The risk is that no other state will want to go, for fear of ending up with its head on the block and deprived of access to capital markets.

This issue of debt owed to the private sector must be resolved as a priority. The only way to do this is to use Special Drawing Rights. [DTS, des actifs du FMI qui peuvent servir de ressources pour les Etats membres de l’institution], which will be issued to the tune of 650 billion dollars. A part will be reallocated from rich countries to less developed countries, which should represent 100 billion dollars for Africa.

How to use these resources?

There are three crises at the same time: the one due to climate change, the one of debt and the one of Covid-19. The SDRs need to be used flexibly in order to respond to all three crises simultaneously. Part of these resources should go to the ADB, which will use them to refinance all development banks in Africa and support projects in the direction of green and inclusive growth.

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These SDRs should also be used to buy back the debts of African countries vis-à-vis private creditors. Finally, we plead for the creation of a financial stabilization system for Africa, as it exists at the level of the European Union. By pooling our resources, the challenge is to better protect Africa from exogenous shocks, to avoid contagion effects in the event of a crisis and to provide a regional safety net that will complement the IMF’s global safety net.