The world is witnessing an era of multifaceted challenges stemming from pandemics, climate change, financial shocks and debt distress. Financing remains at the core of addressing these multifaceted challenges and steering countries towards attaining Agenda 2030 of the Sustainable Development Goals and the African Union’s Agenda 2063.
There is a massive need to raise financial resources to accelerate SDGs implementation. The need to raise additional resources is even more urgent now, given that we are less than seven years from attaining the Agenda 2030. The ECA’s Economic Report on Africa 2020 stated that the annual financing gap to achieve the SDGs in Africa ranges from USD200 billion to USD1.3 trillion per year. The upper limit is more realistic, as the financing gap for all developing countries was estimated by UNCTAD in 2023 to be USD 4 trillion.
In addition to the financing gap, the progress gap between the current status and the targets of Agenda 2030 is also huge. Millions of people are deprived of the basic necessities of a quality life. Also, extreme inequality within and across societies has been on the rise, further derailing the likelihood of achieving SDG targets by 2030. Further, the enormous financing requirement needed to attain the SDGs in six years’ time is coming at a time when the average public debt relative to GDP in Africa exceeds 60 per cent of GDP. According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), as of November 2023, 8 African countries were in debt distress, and 13 were at a high risk of debt distress. For Africa to take charge of its recovery and development aspirations, more needs to be done to bridge the widened financing gap.
The Fourth Financing for Development Conference (FfD4), to be held in Spain from 30 June to 3 July 2025, provides a platform to address financing challenges in the context of these multifaceted problems and the urgent need to accelerate the implementation and achievement of the SDGs. The Conference has the critical mandate to support reform of the international financial architecture to ensure an equitable and inclusive setting, leaving no one behind.
African countries need to examine the priority areas of Africa to address the multidimensional challenges in the field of sustainable finance. In the run-up to the FfD4 and based on the discussion of the second session of the Committee on Economic Governance (CEG) held on 16-17 November 2024, the Africa regional consultation for the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development in Africa, provides an opportunity to examine the needs of African countries and develop a concerted approach to cater African needs in the discussion and action points of the Fourth Financing for Development Conference in 2025.

The regional consultation in Africa will examine and address the below issues.

• What steps need to be taken to address Africa’s unique needs for closing the financing gap and ensuring an equitable and inclusive Global Financial Architecture?
• How can the Fourth Conference on Financing for Development help address the issues of the African Countries in the context of global financial architecture and support the inclusive setting of international rules for taxation, trade, investment, and finance?
• What politically feasible, action-oriented and ambitious proposals should African Member States consider taking forward at FfD4?
• How can FfD4 help rebuild trust in global partnership and multilateralism?
   

Document

• Concept note
• Programme [English] [Français]

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