The Regional Vice President for Eastern and Southern Africa, of the World Bank Group, Her Excellency Dr. Victoria Kwakwa, paid a courtesy call on the Executive Secretary of SADC, His Excellency Mr. Elias Magosi, at the SADC Headquarters, in Gaborone, Botswana, on 9 November 2023.
During the courtesy call, a variety of issues of mutual interest between SADC and the World Bank were discussed with the aim to strengthen and deepen cooperation towards the implementation of the regional integration agenda.
The Regional Vice President highlighted that financing renewable energy and energy efficiency projects in developing countries to accelerate progress toward the Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG 7) was among the World Bank’s focus. Goal 7 of the SDG is about ensuring access to clean and affordable energy, and one of the targets is to ensure that there is access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy for all by 2030.
In this regard, H.E Dr. Kwakwa encouraged the SADC Secretariat to facilitate SADC Member States to undertake regional energy programmes that aim to accelerate electrification, increase investments in renewable energy sources and invest in improving electricity grids.
The SADC Executive Secretary commended the World Bank for its continuous support and assistance to the SADC regional programmes, and highlighted progress on the SADC-World Bank ongoing projects which include:
support to the operationalisation of the Groundwater Management Institute (SADC GMI) and specific Groundwater Management Projects at Member States level;
strengthening the institutional capacity of SADC and participating countries to produce, disseminate and use quality statistics while increasing regional harmonisation and collaboration;
developing and improving public procurement monitoring and evaluation capacity in Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho and Namibia, to inform evidence-based policy and strategy development; and
support to initiatives on Risk Management, Climate Financing, Sustainable Asset Management and Adaptive Climate Services for Resilient Communities.
The SADC Executive Secretary briefed H.E Dr. Kwakwa on the reprioritised projects in the Regional Indicative Strategic Development Plan (RISDP) 2020-2030 which the SADC Secretariat is currently mobilising resources for. The prioritised projects cover strategic areas of the RISDP 2020–2030 on:
- Peace, Security, and Good Governance;
- Industrial Development and Market Integration;
- Infrastructure Development in Support of Regional Integration;
Social and Human Capital Development; including Gender, Youth, Environment and Climate Change, and Disaster Risk Management.
