Early Warning System

Regions

Africa

Geographic location where the impacts of the investment may be experienced.

Specific Location

All African countries

Whenever identified, the area within countries where the impacts of the investment may be experienced. Exact locations of projects may not be identified fully or at all in project documents. Please review updated project documents and community-led assessments.

Financial Institutions

African Development Bank (AFDB)

International, regional and national development finance institutions. Many of these banks have a public interest mission, such as poverty reduction.

Project Status

Approved

Stage of the project cycle. Stages vary by development bank and can include: pending, approval, implementation, and closed or completed.

Bank Risk Rating

Environmental and social categorization assessed by the development bank as a measure of the planned project’s environmental and social impacts. A higher risk rating may require more due diligence to limit or avoid harm to people and the environment. For example, "A" or "B" are risk categories where "A" represents the highest amount of risk. Results will include projects that specifically recorded a rating, all other projects are marked ‘U’ for "Undisclosed."

Voting Date

Dec 16, 2024

Date when project documentation and funding is reviewed by the Board for consideration and approval. Some development banks will state a "board date" or "decision date." When funding approval is obtained, the legal documents are accepted and signed, the implementation phase begins.

Borrower

Regional

A public entity (government or state-owned) provided with funds or financial support to manage and/or implement a project.

Sectors

Education and Health

The service or industry focus of the investment. A project can have several sectors.

Investment Type(s)

Grant

The categories of the bank investment: loan, grant, guarantee, technical assistance, advisory services, equity and fund.

Investment Amount (USD)

$ 13.29 million

Value listed on project documents at time of disclosure. If necessary, this amount is converted to USD ($) on the date of disclosure. Please review updated project documents for more information.

Bank Documents

Other Related Projects

AFDB-P-Z1-IAD-022 PAN AFRICAN UNIVERSITY SUPPORT PROJECT - PHASE 2

Primary Source

Original disclosure @ AFDB website

Updated in EWS Jun 7, 2025

Contribute Information
Can you contribute information about this project?
Contact the EWS Team

Project Description

If provided by the financial institution, the Early Warning System Team writes a short summary describing the purported development objective of the project and project components. Review the complete project documentation for a detailed description.

According to the Bank’s website, the Project's development objective is to increase the stock of higher-level skills, especially in STEM, required for Africa's economic transformation. This will be achieved by ensuring that the PAU is established and operational in its complete configuration as a recognized full-fledged university system. The PAU will improve regional cooperation and coordination in higher education to enhance the relevance of skills and research produced to Africa's development needs.

PAU will serve all African countries, representing a population of 1.4 billion people, through developing skills in specific thematic areas. In particular, the University and its Institutes is critical for skilling the youth in Africa, who are expected, by 2030, to make up to 42% of the world's youth and account for 75% of those under the age of 35 in Africa18. The host countries of the PAU Rectorate and the three Institutes, Algeria, Cameroon, and Kenya are the actual geographical locations. The AUC, located in Addis Ababa, is the coordinating agency.
The scholarship programme will provide financial support to 1420 MSc and PhD students, with 40% of women admitted to the PAU. It is expected that 1136 young students will graduate (896 with MSc and 240 PhD), creating more than 900 jobs for youth, including 300 green jobs. PAU graduates are generally employed in academia (teaching and research), private sector companies and various government entities in charge of sector policies or start their own business. Their insertion in the job market is facilitated by the fact that, through the innovation and entrepreneurship centre (iHub) installed in each of the institutes in collaboration with the private sector, students receive entrepreneurship training, conduct R&D with the private sector, develop solutions and prototypes which could pave the way for start-ups. The students will be drawn from across 54 African countries, including those from fragile contexts/transition states, forcibly displaced persons (refugees, IDPs, returnees), host communities and other marginalized groups (e.g. persons with disabilities, first-generation students). Through gender sensitization and awareness raising about the PAU, the AUC and the Rectorate will endeavour to attract female students to reach parity in student admissions. The project will provide research grants and African researchers resources to improve their research productivity and publications. This project also aims at fostering the mobility of African researchers, men and women. Higher education faculty members and researchers will benefit from PAU through the exchange programmes and interactions with academia and scientists from African institutions and abroad.

Early Warning System Project Analysis

For a project with severe or irreversible impacts to local community and natural resources, the Early Warning System Team may conduct a thorough analysis regarding its potential impacts to human and environmental rights.

Environmental Category: [2] Moderate Risk

Investment Description

Here you can find a list of individual development financial institutions that finance the project.

African Development Bank (AFDB)

Finance Type: Standard grant
Commitments (UA): 10,000,000
Conversion Rate USD (2024-12-16): 1,32974

Contact Information

This section aims to support the local communities and local CSO to get to know which stakeholders are involved in a project with their roles and responsibilities. If available, there may be a complaint office for the respective bank which operates independently to receive and determine violations in policy and practice. Independent Accountability Mechanisms receive and respond to complaints. Most Independent Accountability Mechanisms offer two functions for addressing complaints: dispute resolution and compliance review.

Keiko TAKEI
Education Analyst, AHHD1
African Development Bank
k.takei@afdb.org
www.afdb.org