CHISHIMBA BWALYA
Lusaka
Zambia was one of the Southern African countries that experienced drought last year which affected both food security and energy provision. According to a report by NASA Earth Observatory, February 2024 was the driest February in the 40-year data record for an area spanning much of Zambia, Zimbabwe, southeastern Angola, and northern Botswana.
The publication further states that by the end of February, maize crops had withered and died on 1 million hectares in central and southern Zambia—almost half of the country’s maize-growing area.
Africa is the most vulnerable continent to climate change, as confirmed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Without urgent action, climate change will affect every aspect of life in Africa and the reverberations will be felt worldwide.
Africa experiences climate change through water catastrophes- droughts, floods and cyclones.
The impact of climate change in Africa is most visible in water, which is ironically at the heart of Africa’s development.
This is why African countries are now on a drive to accelerate investment into climate resilience and adaptation. On its part, Zambia is seeking to raise nearly $6 billion by 2030 to ensure the availability of water and increased water investments through the Zambia Water Investment Programme (ZIP).
Launched in 2022 by President Hakainde Hichilema, the ZIP was developed under the Continental Africa Water Investment Programme (AIP) which was adopted by the African Heads of State and Government in February 2021 during the 34th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of the African Union.
The ZIP is an initiative that seeks to mobilise funding for the country’s water resource, sanitation and climate resilience.
Like many African countries, Zambia faces a lot of challenges in accessing climate finance. This has prompted the Government through its Ministry of Water Development and Sanitation to explore blended financing mechanisms to integrate public, philanthropic, and private sector investments, thereby de-risking water investments and making them more attractive for commercial financing.
It is against this background that Zambia received funding from the Green Climate Fund to develop a blended financing facility for the ZIP.
The funding is part of the Readiness Support for the African Union Multi-Country Programme aimed at accelerating water and climate resilience investments through the Africa Water Investment Programme (AU-AIP Multi-Country GCF Readiness Project), funded by the Green Climate Fund (GCF).
The primary objective is to address challenges related to limited and inconsistent capacity to access climate finance and to incorporate GCF guidelines on environmental and social safeguards, gender policies, and indigenous peoples’ inclusion.
“As one of the AIP founding countries, Zambia will support the establishment of the AIP international blended climate resilient water investment facility to leverage ODA, grant finance or public resources to derisk priority climate resilient water investments using a variety of innovative financial instruments and sources including sovereign wealth funds guarantees, institutional investors and private equity, value-based impact investment, and climate finance,” explained Mr. Joseph Mbinji, AU-AIP Multi-Country GCF Readiness Project at the Global Water Partnership Southern Africa (GWPSA), which is supporting the African Union Commission in the implementation of the project.
As part of the deliverables for Zambia under the AU-AIP Multi-Country GCF Readiness Project, the Ministry of Water Development and Sanitation, with support from GWPSA held a stakeholder consultative workshop on 11th March 2025 to kickstart the process of developing a blended financing facility for the Zambia Water Investment Programme.
Speaking at the event, Acting Permanent Secretary under the Ministry of Water Development and Sanitation, Mr. Richard Kangwa called for a “paradigm shift” if Zambia is to meet the $6 billion target in the next five years.
“Addressing these challenges demands a paradigm shift in how we mobilize and allocate financial resources. We must move beyond traditional funding models and embrace a collaborative financing approach that integrates public and private investments, donor support, and innovative financial instruments.
“It is for this reason that we have gathered here today—to discuss blended financing as a pathway to unlocking investment for water security. The adoption of blended financing provides an opportunity to bridge funding gaps by leveraging public resources to attract private investment and drive sustainable development in the water sector,” explained Mr. Kangwa.
He also reiterated the Government’s goal of achieving national water security and universal access to sanitation, in alignment with the objectives of the Continental Africa Water Investment Programme (AIP). The Acting Permanent Secretary then called for collaborative efforts from all relevant stakeholders to ensure the successful implementation of the ZIP.
On his part, Zambia’s National Coordinator for the National Designated Authority Mr. Billy Katontonka hailed GWPSA and the Zambia Government for securing GCF funding and making Zambia one of the few African countries that have developed detailed plans for sectoral adaptation and mitigation.
Mr. Katontoka further urged stakeholders present to call on his office for guidelines to mobilise climate finance and the criteria to meet the standards required by key international funding sources such as the Green Climate Fund.
Mr. Mbinji described the workshop as productive.
“The outcome of today’s first stakeholder consultative meeting was very progressive. One thing which came out very clear was that all stakeholders are in agreement that following the development of the climate-resilient water investment programme for Zambia, we now need to mobilize resources to finance investment ideas. At the moment, Zambia relies on public sector financing, which is not sufficient because the Government has so many competing needs and demands. This is why even at continental level we have a huge funding gap of about $30 billion that needs to be pumped into the water sector annually and many countries are struggling to meet that,” said Mr. Mbinji.
Among others, the AU-AIP multi-country GCF Readiness Programme aims to enhance the countries’ capacity for climate finance programming and Direct Access to climate finance, focusing on institutions that can support water-sector-related activities. It also seeks to enhance strategic frameworks for climate-resilient investment planning for water management through the development of Water Investment Programmes.
The project is being implemented in 15 African countries, including Burundi, Central African Republic, Chad, Eswatini, Ghana, Guinea, Malawi, Mali, Morocco, Mozambique, Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Tunisia, and Zambia in the ongoing first phase.
