• Investment from countries, including G7 host UK, will help boost economies and jobs across the continent
• The G7 Development Finance Institutions (DFIs) and multilateral partners commit to invest over $80bn in the private sector in Africa over the next five years
• First time G7 DFIs have come together to make collective commitment on funding for Africa

G7 countries, along with multilateral partners, have this week announced an $80 billion commitment to invest in the private sector across Africa.

This investment, set to roll out over the next five years, will see the G7 Development Finance Institutions (DFIs), including the UK’s CDC Group, support sustainable economic recovery and growth in Africa. Other investors include the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation, the African Development Bank, the European Investment Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

The investments will support the long-term development objectives of African economies, including those which have been negatively hit by the Covid-19 pandemic. It is the first time the G7 DFIs have come together to make a collective partnership commitment to the African continent.

The UK’s CDC Group invests in private sector businesses in Africa and South Asia, to bring about positive environmental, social and economic change.

The UK’s investments in Africa over the next five years will be drawn from existing capital and focus on renewable power, infrastructure, manufacturing, agriculture and technology sectors. These investments will collectively provide clean, reliable power to millions of people, give underserved markets better access to finance, and help create jobs and reduce poverty.

Minister for Africa James Duddridge said:

“The UK is proud to back this commitment by world leaders at the G7 Summit to invest more than $80 billion in Africa’s private sector over the next 5 years.

“This investment will create jobs, boost economic growth, help tackle climate change and fight poverty. It comes at a crucial time as the continent rebuilds its economies, severely impacted by Covid-19.”

Previous UK investments through CDC Group have helped over 9.9 million people in East Africa light their homes through solar panel technology, contributed over 40% of the installed electricity capacity in Kenya, Uganda, and Benin and added over 18,000km of fibre optic cabling from Cairo to Cape Town.

Nick O’Donohoe, CEO of CDC Group, said:

“The patient, high quality capital that DFIs provide is urgently needed if African economies are to start to rebuild quickly from the impact of the pandemic. CDC is committed to building long term investment partnerships in Africa that fuel sustainable private sector growth in support of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.”

Notes to editors

• The G7 DFI group consists of CDC (UK), Proparco (France), JICA and JBIC (Japan), DFC (US), FinDev Canada (Canada), DEG (Germany) and CDP (Italy). This commitment is also supported by the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation, the African Development Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the European Investment Bank

• CDC’s investments in Africa include helping 700,000 people across East Africa to light their homes through solar panels bought from one of CDC’s investees, M-KOPA. In the DRC, where 72% of the population lives in extreme poverty, CDC has backed Liquid Telecom to help it expand its network and lay 2,600km of fibre optic cable in DRC – the equivalent distance of London to Moscow. Greenlight Planet is providing solar home systems on a pay-as-you-go basis to 9.9 million people across Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Nigeria, of which 80 per cent are rural customers.

Arman Yusuf Rahmani was today sentenced to 2 years and 7 months at Preston Crown Court after pleading guilty to breaking UK immigration law.

Rahmani, a 21 year old from Iran who had been granted asylum in the UK after entering the UK in the back of a lorry, was caught attempting to smuggle people from France and Belgium to the UK.

From December 2018 to April 2019, Rahmani hired 6 different ‘man with van’ drivers advertising their services on social media and agreed for them to drive from the UK to France or Belgium to collect and transport second-hand furniture to the UK.

Unknown to the hired drivers, hidden within the sofas were migrants who had paid to be smuggled into the UK concealed in the bases. The drivers were instructed not to help with loading the vehicles and were distracted while the loading took place.

Within 2 years of entering the UK, Rahmani had established a criminal network to facilitate foreign nationals illegally into the UK.

Minister for Immigration Compliance & Justice, Chris Philip, said:

Rahmani showed a blatant disregard for the laws of the UK, a country which provided him with safety and a place to live for which he has rightly paid the price.

This case shows the lengths criminals will go to profit from our broken asylum system by putting people’s lives at risk

We are aiming to step up prosecution of those smuggling people into the country which is why this government is bringing legislation through our New Plan for Immigration, breaking the business model of these heinous people smuggling networks and save lives.

Video footage and photographs later taken of the hiding spots show that any plea for help from those in the back of the van would not have been heard, confirming Rahmani had no regard for the welfare of the people he was paid to hide.

Upon arrival at the UK border in France, UK Border Force officers searched the vans and quickly identified the migrants hiding inside. All the illegal migrants discovered claimed to be Iraqi males, under 18 years of age.

Katie Brown, CFI Investigator said:

Today’s sentence is the result of an excellent investigation which brought to an end Rahmani’s pattern of criminality.

People smugglers are motivated by money alone and show no regard for the safety of those they exploit.

This case is a message that we never stop looking for those involved in immigration crime.

Rahmani will see out his 2-year 7-month sentence at which point he will be eligible for deportation as a Foreign National Offender (FNO).

The government’s New Plan for Immigration will help ensure the maximum sentence for illegally entering the UK is served to those who break our laws and will introduce a maximum life sentence for those facilitating illegal entry.

Responding to the Dasgupta Review on The Economics of Biodiversity, which was published earlier in the year, the Government agreed with the Review’s central conclusion that nature, and the biodiversity that underpins it, ultimately sustains economies, livelihoods and well-being.

The Government is committed to delivering a ‘nature positive’ future, in which we leave the environment in a better state than we found it, and ensure economic and financial decision-making is geared towards delivering that.

New Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects in England, such as future transport and energy projects, will as a result need to provide a net gain in biodiversity and habitats for wildlife – through an amendment to be made to the Environment Bill. In parallel, as part of its ambition to be the one of the most environmentally responsible infrastructure projects ever delivered in the UK, HS2 – Europe’s largest infrastructure project – will aim to deliver a net gain in biodiversity on its Crewe-Manchester leg.

The Government has also committed today to ensuring all new UK bilateral aid spending does no harm to nature.

Additionally, building on its ambitious existing nature agenda, and in the run up to COP26, the Review response sets out how the Government will go further, including by:

• committing up to £3 million additional support to the development of the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures framework – a market-led initiative which will support business in assessing emerging nature-related risks and opportunities

• working with the Office for National Statistics to improve the way nature is incorporated into our national accounts

• further improving Government guidance for embedding environmental considerations into policy-making processes

• incorporating biodiversity into the UK Government Green Financing Framework

• joining the OECD Paris Collaborative on green budgeting, an initiative to encourage governments to incorporate climate and environmental considerations into their financial and fiscal decisions

The Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury, Kemi Badenoch, said:

Protecting and enhancing the natural environment, and the biodiversity that underpins it, is crucial to supporting sustainable, resilient economies, livelihoods and well-being.

The Government has an ambitious nature agenda and our response to the independent Dasgupta Review sets out the ways in which the Government will go further to ensure our economy supports nature and wildlife – from infrastructure at home to bilateral aid spending overseas.

In this crucial year for international action to address biodiversity loss, the UK will continue to ensure the natural environment remains at the top of the international agenda.

Environment Secretary, George Eustice said:

If we want to realise the aspiration set out in Professor Dasgupta’s landmark Review to rebalance humanity’s relationship with nature, then we need policies that will both protect and enhance the supply of our natural assets.

This is what lies at the heart of the Government’s 25 Year Environment Plan, and our new measures to embed biodiversity net gain further in the planning system for major infrastructure, through our landmark Environment Bill. It’s also behind our approach to future farming policy and other initiatives such as £3 billion for climate change solutions that restore nature globally and our new due diligence law to clean up our supply chains and help tackle illegal deforestation.

Significant progress is already being made towards delivering a nature positive future, and today’s response builds on a range of action already taken. This includes a new target on species abundance for 2030, aimed at halting species decline, and a commitment to protect 30% of the UK’s land and ocean by 2030 along with encouraging others to do the same, including through the UK’s G7 Presidency where yesterday, the G7 endorsed a Nature Compact to halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030

G7 leaders also agreed plans to transform the financing of infrastructure projects in developing countries – the ‘Build Back Better for the World’ plan – bringing together G7 countries under the UK’s presidency to develop an offer for high quality financing for vital infrastructure, from railways in Africa to wind farms in Asia.

The Prime Minister launched the UK’s £500m Blue Planet Fund to support countries including Ghana, Indonesia and Pacific island states to tackle unsustainable fishing, protect and restore coastal ecosystems like mangroves and coral reefs, and reduce marine pollution.

In England, the support provided to the agricultural sector is being reoriented to improve the environment, animal health and welfare, and reduce carbon emissions. The government has also committed to spend at least £3 billion of the UK’s International Climate Finance on nature and biodiversity over five years. And the government has set out a Ten Point Plan for a green industrial revolution which will mobilise £12 billion of government investment to create and support up to 250,000 highly-skilled green jobs across the UK.

At the recent G7 Finance Ministers meeting, agreement was also reached to implement and strengthen registries of company beneficial ownership information. This is a major step forward in global efforts to tackle illicit finance and will also boost the UK’s work as G7 President to tackle environmental crimes – like the illegal wildlife trade and illegal logging.

Further information

• The government’s full response can be read here

• The independent Dasgupta Review on The Economics of Biodiversity was commissioned by the government in 2019 and was published on February 2021. It is available here

• Last week the Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury supported the launch of the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD), which will help to better Integrate nature into financial decision-making. See here

• The HS2 announcement goes further than the existing commitment of no net loss in biodiversity on HS2, and sets a new standard for HS2’s environmental commitments. Going forward the aim is to ensure that HS2 continues to be one of the most environmentally responsible infrastructure projects ever delivered in the UK.

• The Government and HS2 Ltd recognise that ancient woodland is an irreplaceable resource. Ancient woodland, and all associated compensation, is excluded from the current HS2 No Net Loss (NNL) biodiversity calculations, and will continue to be excluded from our net gain goal. The project will continue to seek to further reduce the impacts of the scheme on all irreplaceable habitats.

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