AfricanFinance

Ethiopian President Mulartu Teshome inaugurated the Reppie waste-to-energy facility, Africa’s first waste-to-energy facility set up in the country. President Mulatu during the inauguration event said investment in energy projects is crucial if Ethiopia is to achieve its aim of becoming an environmentally friendly industrialized middle-income economy by 2025. “As Africa’s first waste-to-energy facility, Reppie’s completion and operation shows great vision,” he said. “It has found a green road to urban development in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and Africa,” said the President. Also Read:Environment-friendly wastewater treatment plant launched in South Africa The Reppie waste-to-energy facility The Reppie waste-to-energy facility is located in Addis Ababa, was constructed by China National Electrical Engineering Company (CNEEC) but fully financed by the Ethiopian government. The project according to Mulartu is expected to process 1,400 tons of solid waste daily. According to th...

The Nigerian Sovereign Investment Authority (NSIA) recently released its 2017 financial report. One of the takeaways from that report is that net profit took a turn for the worse falling from N149 billion to N27 billion representing a decrease of 82%. The media is already awash with that news and we will, therefore, not bother readers with it in this piece. However, there are a few things that have not been talked about, not even by Dr Uche Orji, the Managing Director and CEO of the Authority, in his press conference after the release but the eagle eyes of analysts at Quantitative Financial Analytics Ltd have been able to catch those observations. One of such is that the NSIA re-balanced their investment portfolio in terms of geographical allocation of assets. That rebalancing led to a reduction in exposure to the Middle East and the US. In 2016, out of the group’s total investment portfolio value of N399.7 billion, N121 billion or 30% was invested in various investment types ...

An innovative multi-million-dollar programme in Kenya seeks to connect 14,000 households and businesses to green mini-grids by the end of 2018. The programme dubbed the  Green Mini Grid (GMG) Facility Kenya  aims to achieve this through scaling up private utilities delivering renewable electricity to rural communities. It is based on results-based financing and could be a model for other sub-Saharan countries dealing with energy poverty. This initiative is the brainchild of the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID), recently provided funds to three private utilities namely; RVE.SOL, PowerGen Renewable Energy and Powerhive to build sites in dozens of villages located in four counties in the western part of the country. According to the companies, total grants allocated for the projects amount to about €5.2 million ($6 million). Localised power generation Mini-grids are localised power generation and distribution infrastructure, ideal for serving remo...

In response to low electrification rates in some remote areas across Africa, the African Development Bank (AfDB) has approved a proposal to help Zola EDF Côte d’Ivoire (ZECI), to mobilise a loan in local currency to the tune of $28 million. The loan has been arranged by Société Générale de Banque in Côte d’Ivoire (SGBCI) and Crédit Agricole Corporate and Investment Bank (Crédit Agricole CIB). The AfDB will provide a partial credit guarantee covering part of the guaranteed loan facility as a catalyst. NEoT CI, the special purpose vehicle currently being created to mobilise the receivables-backed senior loan is sponsored by NEoT Offgrid Africa (NOA), an investment platform focused on distributed energy in Africa, managed by NEoT Capital, with Meridiam and EDF as investors. Additionally, the Grameen Crédit Agricole Foundation will participate in the financing of ZECI and will monitor environmental and social norms for the duration of the transaction. Local currency financin...

Africa’s second most populous country Ethiopia, has set an ambitious target to double the length of its roads network by 2020 from its extent in 2015.This is according to the government’s road authority . In 2015, at the end of GTP-I, the road network had reached 100,000km. Now the network stands at 121,171km, according to the roads ministry, including gravel roads. This represents a large expansion from 1990, when there were just 19,000km of roads. About 90% of them are asphalt. Ethiopia’s road-building now consumes about a quarter of the federal government’s annual infrastructure spending.According to Samson Wondimu, a Director at the Ministry, the road building programme had spent about US $11bn over the past 20 years, and that the annual budget for the roads sector had grown 20% to reach US $1.7bn. The present programme includes flagship projects such as the 200km Hawassa expressway in the central-southern area of the country, which got under way after a 4 year ...

South African state owned utilty  Eskom Holdings SOC  Ltd has signed a Power Purchase Agreement, PPA with  Building Energy  for the construction of the 147 MW wind farm in Roggeveld and a 4.7 MW mini hydroelectric plant in Free State which will see the overall investment in the construction of the two plants amounts to US $376 m. The agreement was officiated with the presence of South African Energy Minister Jeff Radebe and Matteo Brambilla, Building Energy Managing Director Africa and Middle East. “We are delighted to have signed the agreement for the construction of the Roggeveld plant, which represents our first wind farm in South Africa”, said Matteo Brambilla. The wind farm is set to generate around 613 GWh per year where else the small-hydroelectric plant will generate around 28 GWh of energy annually on completion. The energy generated will satisfy the energy needs of roughly 49.200 households every year while avoiding the emission of about 502.900 to...

South Africa is considering an initial price talk into the Eurobond market of about 6% and 6.37%. South Africa is hoping to ride a wave of improved investor sentiment by tapping the Eurobond market for the first time under new President Cyril Ramaphosa, as his administration tackles mismanagement and corruption in the continent’s most industrialised economy. The country is marketing dollar securities maturing in 2030 and 2048, with initial price talk of about 6% and 6.37%, respectively, according to a person familiar with the transaction, who asked not to be identified because they’re not authorised to speak about it. South Africa had budgeted to sell $3 billion of international debt this fiscal year, according to Treasury documents. South African assets have outperformed emerging markets overall since late last year, as Ramaphosa, then deputy president and a former businessman and lawyer, manoeuvred to succeed Jacob Zuma as president. The rand has strengthened 16% against ...