The Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and the RES4Africa Foundation have jointly released a series of country regulatory reviews on electricity markets in Ethiopia, Rwanda, Zambia, South Africa and Ghana
The reports aiming to support the crowding-in of scaled private sector investment in generation, networks and off-grid markets, were released on 8 December 20201 during an Expert Group Meeting on the theme “Enhancing Electricity Market Regulation in Africa to Accelerate Participation of the Private Sector in Infrastructure Investment.” The publications are a result of a productive partnership between ECA, through its SDG7 Finance initiative pillar area on energy sector governance, and the RES4Africa Foundation - through its Missing Links initiative.
In 2020 alone, the global energy market saw about $1.9 trillion in investments, of which emerging and developing countries attracted 1/5th. Africa captured only a fraction, signaling the crucial importance of addressing private sector investment participation challenges in the electricity market. Towards this end, addressing regulatory and policy challenges in the sector is essential.
The High-Level Dialogue on Energy (HLDE), which took place in September 2021 considered key recommendations particularly under the thematic area of Finance and Investment to meet SDG7 goals. The HLDE called for a robust private sector participation in energy infrastructure investment across the value chain by addressing uncertainties in policy and regulatory environments. In this regard, the HLDE recommended member States to address the de-risking of projects and fixing regulatory barriers to ensure market openness, attractiveness, and readiness for private-sector finance.
