Japan’s bold $5.5 bn Africa push: Aims to link Indian Ocean economies, give AI boost

Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba on Thursday announced the creation of a new Indian Ocean–Africa economic zone, in a bid to boost ties with the continent.

The proposal was presented at the ninth Tokyo International Conference on African Development, where Ishiba said that the new economic zone would connect economies across the Indian Ocean, including India and West Asia, and strengthen Africa’s development.

Japan has pledged $5.5 billion in loans via the African Development Bank to help tackle governments on the continent’s mounting debt burdens. Tokyo has also unveiled plans to train 30,000 AI specialists over the next three years, aiming to accelerate digital transformation and drive job growth across the region.

Angola’s President and African Union Chair, João Lourenço, said, “The African continent continues to face persistent barriers and limited, complex access to international financing … many African countries have been rated as high-risk borrowers, making them barely eligible for low-cost capital. Yet such capital is absolutely essential for investment in infrastructure, electrification, industrialisation, and technological advancement.”

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Africa has everything it takes to become a “renewable superpower”, UN head Antonio Guterres said, as he called for greater investment in green energy across the resource-rich continent.

Guterres spoke at a three-day development conference in Japan attended by African leaders, where Tokyo is offering itself as an alternative to China as African nations reel from a debt crisis exacerbated by Western aid cuts, conflict and climate change.

“We must mobilise finance and technology, so that Africa’s natural wealth benefits African people, we must build a thriving renewables and manufacturing base across the continent,” Guterres said at the Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD).

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“Green power in Africa lowers energy costs, diversifies supply chains and accelerates decarbonisation for everyone.”

Guterres warned in his speech in the Japanese port city of Yokohama that “debt must not drown development” and that Africa needed increased concessional finance and greater lending capacity from multilateral development banks.

With inputs from agencies