April 10 (Renewables Now) – The Investec-managed Emerging Africa Infrastructure Fund (EAIF) has secured USD 385 million (EUR 311m) in new long-term debt capital through its latest fundraising round, it was announced today.
EAIF was created to mobilise capital from public and private sources to lend to infrastructure businesses in sub-Saharan Africa. It invests in eight different sectors, including energy generation. This specific field currently accounts for about 50% of EAIF’s entire loan portfolio and the fund aims to have at least 50% of its future power portfolio invested in renewables, it said in a statement.
Just last year, EAIF provided finance to independent power producers (IPPs) that will deploy 90 MW of new solar power capacity in Africa.
The newly-secured funds will be spent over the next five years. They came from German development bank KfW, Dutch development finance institution FMO, Standard Chartered Bank and the African Development Bank (AfDB). German insurer Allianz SE (ETR:ALV) has meanwhile become the first commercial institutional investor.
