17 African Countries Endorse Mission 300 Energy Compacts

Seventeen African governments committed to reforms and actionable National Energy Compacts under Mission 300 at the Bloomberg Philanthropies Global Forum to expand electricity access and help connect 300 million Africans by 2030.

• Main announcement/action: Seventeen countries (Benin, Botswana, Burundi, Cameroon, Comoros, Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Kenya, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, São Tomé and Principe, Sierra Leone, and Togo) endorsed National Energy Compacts—practical blueprints integrating infrastructure, financing, and policy—aimed at expanding electricity access, guiding public spending, triggering reforms, and attracting private capital. The Mission 300 partnership (led by the World Bank Group and African Development Bank Group) reports 30 million people already connected and more than 100 million in the pipeline, with the overarching target to connect 300 million Africans by 2030.
• Background and implementation details: Development partners supporting implementation include the Rockefeller Foundation, GEAPP, SEforALL, and the World Bank’s ESMAP trust fund; many development finance institutions are providing co-financing and technical assistance. Earlier this year additional countries (Chad, Côte d’Ivoire, DRC, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Tanzania, Zambia) endorsed Compacts and together pledged more than 400 policy actions to strengthen utilities, reduce investor risk, and remove bottlenecks. São Tomé and Principe’s Compact specifically targets raising US$190 million from the private sector to finance its objectives, and multiple Compacts set the implementation timeline of achieving universal access by 2030.