Mattei Plan seeks to mobilize investments to sort out starvation, scale up agricultural output, and scale back the drivers of compelled migration by investing in climate-aligned infrastructure.
Central to Mattei Plan is the $170 billion Rome Course of/Mattei Plan Financing Facility (RPFF), a multi-donor particular fund designed to help infrastructure tasks aligned with local weather targets.
The deal additionally seeks to inject as much as €400 million into non-public fairness funds over the following 5 years.
Italy is more and more positioning itself as an necessary participant in Africa’s improvement journey with the rollout of the Mattei Plan—a daring initiative aimed toward catalyzing financial transformation throughout the continent.
Named after Enrico Mattei, the visionary founding father of Italy’s nationwide oil firm ENI who championed equitable North-South cooperation, the Mattei Plan represents a reimagined partnership mannequin that prioritizes shared prosperity, sustainable improvement, and strategic collaboration.
On the coronary heart of this initiative is the African Growth Financial institution (AfDB), which Italy has chosen as its major monetary accomplice to implement the plan. This strategic alignment underscores Rome’s intent to have interaction Africa not as a passive recipient of support, however as an lively accomplice in progress.
Meals safety, migration, local weather motion at core of Mattei Plan
On Could 8, 2025, a high-profile Italian delegation visited the AfDB headquarters in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, reaffirming Italy’s dedication to fast-tracking the Mattei Plan. Led by Stefano Gatti, Director Basic for Growth Cooperation, and Lorenzo Ortona, Head of the Mattei Plan Activity Power, the workforce included representatives from key establishments resembling Cassa Depositi e Prestiti (CDP), Italy’s Ministry of Finance, the non-public sector, and civil society.
The delegation met with AfDB’s senior management, together with Senior Vice President Marie-Laure Akin-Olugbade and three vice presidents, to discover areas of synergy. The important thing focus? Mobilizing investments to sort out starvation, scale up agricultural output, and scale back the drivers of compelled migration by investing in climate-aligned infrastructure.
Strategic monetary instruments to gas African transformation
Central to the Mattei Plan is the Rome Course of/Mattei Plan Financing Facility (RPFF), a multi-donor particular fund designed to help sovereign infrastructure tasks aligned with local weather targets. Backed with over $170 million from Italy and the United Arab Emirates, the RPFF is already operational and is seen as a foundational pillar of the Mattei technique.
One other essential mechanism is the Progress and Resilience Platform for Africa (Graf), a collaborative enterprise between CDP and AfDB that goals to inject as much as €400 million into non-public fairness funds over the following 5 years. Graf’s goal is to catalyze non-public sector progress by unlocking much-needed capital for African companies, significantly in sectors like renewable power, agriculture, and small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
These initiatives are additional bolstered by a bilateral co-financing facility, designed to foster joint ventures and risk-sharing preparations between Italian and African stakeholders.
A deal with youth empowerment
What units the Mattei Plan aside is its results-oriented construction. As famous by AfDB’s Akin-Olugbade, the AfDB and its concessional arm, the African Growth Fund, have demonstrated a robust observe document of delivering measurable outcomes. Italy’s confidence in these establishments is mirrored in its pledge of €298.88 million to the Fund’s sixteenth replenishment cycle.
Moreover, Italy can also be a key backer of Mission 300, a youth entrepreneurship initiative that aligns with the Mattei Plan’s core imaginative and prescient of harnessing Africa’s demographic dividend for financial improvement. By means of help for innovation and personal sector job creation, the plan addresses the pressing must empower Africa’s burgeoning youth inhabitants.
“We Want All the pieces”: Why the time is now
Within the phrases of Energean CEO Mathios Rigas on the current Spend money on African Vitality Discussion board in Paris, “We don’t have the posh of time.” That sentiment is echoed all through the Mattei Plan’s framework. The plan is a response to an pressing actuality: Africa’s untapped potential in pure assets, human capital, and market measurement have to be unlocked rapidly and sustainably.
By creating constructions that mix public finance with non-public sector capital, the Mattei Plan seeks to de-risk funding whereas providing tangible returns. For policymakers, this is a chance to draw high-quality, long-term investments. For traders, it offers a well-defined, strategically backed entry level into high-growth African markets.
A Template for Future Partnerships
Past the specifics of economic instruments and coverage frameworks, the Mattei Plan aspires to be a blueprint for future worldwide cooperation with Africa. It shifts the narrative from dependency to partnership, from charity to funding, and from guarantees to tasks.
Within the phrases of AfDB’s Senior Vice President Akin-Olugbade: “There’s a leveraging impact that multilateral improvement banks have that generally bilateral assets would not have. And we have to make the most of this.” By partaking trusted establishments and selling transparency, Italy is constructing a basis of credibility and influence.
A cautious guess on Africa’s future
The Mattei Plan isn’t just an support technique—it’s a daring guess on Africa’s future. The plan combines diplomatic engagement, monetary innovation, and political will to place Africa as a world progress engine.
For African leaders, the message is obvious: seize this second to align nationwide improvement plans with the alternatives the Mattei Plan brings. For the non-public sector, the instruments are being laid out to unlock new markets and generate worth. And for worldwide companions, Italy is providing a mannequin of how significant cooperation with Africa can—and may—be performed within the twenty first century.
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