African Development Bank signs MoU with ECOWAS for $3.56 million grant to develop West Africa’s pharma industry

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Editorial Staff

The project’s total cost is $3.77 million, to which the ECOWAS Commission will provide $200,000 in cash and $400,000 in-kind

THE African Development Bank (AfDB) and the Commission of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) have signed a memorandum of understanding for $3.56 million in grant funding to support the development of pharmaceutical industries in West Africa.

During the signing ceremony held in Abuja, the African Development Bank’s Director General for Nigeria, Lamin Barrow said: ‘The Covid-19 crisis has further exposed the fragility of our national healthcare systems and posed significant disruptions to the global health and pharmaceutical supply chains. This underscores the urgency of accelerating efforts to ensure a minimum level of supply of health products.’

The project will enhance the pharmaceutical industry’s competitiveness through improved quality and product standards and help ensure that the region complies with best practices in manufacturing pharmaceutical products and supplies. It will strengthen regional training institutions and laboratories to ensure that the required skills are available to support the industry’s regional growth in a gender-sensitive and environmentally friendly manner.

In response to calls from the African Union and the pharmaceutical industry, the African Development Bank has taken a leadership role in developing and driving a continental Vision and Action Plan for a new African Pharmaceutical order. Bank Group President Akinwumi A. Adesina announced last year that the institution would mobilise up to $3bn to support this development.

The project will also advance the Bank’s efforts to support the harmonization of the regulatory environment for pharmaceuticals across Africa at the regional and continental levels. This, in tandem with the operationalisation of the African Continental Free Trade Area, will deepen intra-African integration and trade, boosting regional markets.

The Bank’s Vice President for Private Sector, Infrastructure and Industrialisation, Solomon Quaynor, said: ‘To develop the pharmaceutical industry, the African Development Bank will help to develop local production capacities to increase the market share of African (local and regional) pharmaceutical production value to 45-55 percent by 2030.’

The project aligns with three of the African Development Bank’s High Five strategic priorities: Industrialize Africa, Integrate Africa, and Improve the quality of life for the people of Africa. It also advances the Bank’s Regional Integration Strategy for West Africa, and is in line with the Bank’s gender strategy, and its strategic response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The ECOWAS Commission will be the executing agency for this project, which will run for two years, starting from 2022. The West African Health Organisation will be the implementing agency.