More than 3,000 delegates will gather in Brazzaville, Republic of Congo, for the 2026 Annual Meetings of the African Development Bank Group (www.AfDB.org) from 25 to 29 May. It will be the sixty-first meeting of the Board of Governors of the African Development Bank, and the fifty-second of the African Development Fund (ADF).
The Kintele Conference Centre, venue of the meetings, offers panoramic views of the Congo River whose massive flow is estimated to potentially generate enough electricity to power much of Africa. Against that backdrop, delegates from the Bank’s 81 member-countries will reflect on the theme: “Mobilising Africa’s Development Financing at Scale in a Fragmented World.”
This theme for this year reflects a stark reality. Capital is tight. Inflows from Official Development Assistance (ODA) have declined. Risk is priced higher. Supply chains are less predictable. Yet, Africa needs long-term finance for energy, food security, climate adaptation, infrastructure, and jobs for a growing and anxious population. Meanwhile, the continent’s development financing gap stands at $400 billion per year. That chasm demands audacious solutions.
The key question in Brazzaville is simple: how can Africa raise development finance at scale, at speed, and at lower cost, primarily from its own resources, to turn the continent’s vast and varied assets and opportunities into investable pipelines to deliver socio-economic impact?
The 2026 Meetings are the first for Dr Sidi Ould Tah, who took office in September 2025 as the ninth President of the Bank Group. A key early achievement under his leadership is the historic $11 billion seventeenth replenishment of the African Development Fund (ADF-17) in London in December last year. The ADF, the Bank’s concessional lending arm, supports low-income and fragile African member-countries with soft loans and grants. Twenty-four African countries – a record number – pledged $182.7 million to the ADF.
Significantly, Africa holds an estimated $4 trillion in pension and sovereign wealth funds, and similar savings mechanisms; however, these resources sit in fragments. Under Dr Ould Tah’s New African Financial Architecture for Development (NAFAD), these resources will be marshalled and leveraged to unleash the continent’s capital power and, in his words, “make every dollar work like ten.”
NAFAD received the nod of approval from leaders and representatives of Africa’s finance ecosystem in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire, in April this year, following its endorsement by AU Heads of State Summit in Addis Ababa in February. NAFAD is anchored to the Four Cardinal Points, the President’s strategic vision for the Bank Group to unlock Africa’s capital power, strengthen its financial sovereignty, while investing in human capital and MSMEs to support youth and women, and building infrastructure and competitive value chains. These strategies are expected to receive keen attention in Brazzaville.
Heads of State and Government, Finance Ministers, Central Bank Governors, private sector, finance and civil society leaders will participate in consultative meetings, plenaries and knowledge sessions.
The Annual Meetings constitute the most important statutory event of the Bank Group, where the Boards of Governors, the highest decision-making and oversight bodies, review performance over the preceding year, and parse strategies for the future.
The Meetings in Brazzaville will also see the launch of the 2026 edition of the African Economic Outlook (AEO) report, produced by the Bank Group. The data-rich report, to be made public on 26 May, offers projections for economic prospects for the continent, including analyses of the prospects for each region. The AEO is one of the continent’s most influential economic publications. Its release is highly anticipated, as it serves as a reference document and policy guide for governments, investors, banks, and international financial and academic institutions.
Distributed by APO Group on behalf of African Development Bank Group (AfDB).
