“Making maternal health a driver of economic transformation in Africa”
On the sidelines of the African Development Bank Group’s Annual Meetings in Brazzaville, Financial Afrik interviewed Mrs. Diene Keita, Executive Director of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations. The interview, conducted on May 26, follows the signing of a strategic partnership between UNFPA and the African Development Bank. The partnership between the two institutions focuses on maternal health, demographic dividend, and new financing mechanisms for African development.
Financial Afrik: The United Nations Population Fund has just signed a new partnership agreement with the African Development Bank. How do you plan to concretely translate the objective of making maternal health a true lever for economic transformation and capturing the demographic dividend in Africa?
Diene Keita: Thank you for this question. In the aftermath of Africa Day celebrated on May 25th each year, this partnership has a highly symbolic significance. It fully aligns with the vision of the African Union’s Agenda 2063, the Africa we want.
Concretely, our common ambition is to place essential macroeconomic and social indicators at the heart of public policies to support states in building inclusive and sustainable growth.
Today, Africa still accounts for over 70% of maternal deaths worldwide, even though the majority of these deaths could be prevented. To reverse this trend, investment in appropriate social infrastructure, strengthening health personnel training – doctors, nurses, midwives – and ensuring their availability even in the most remote areas are necessary.
This partnership between the AfDB and UNFPA aims to help governments better plan their development, integrating a fundamental reality: eliminating poverty and inequality necessarily requires massive investments in health and education.
Our second objective is to ensure that mobilized resources are effectively directed towards these priorities.
Financial Afrik: What innovative financing and implementation mechanisms do you plan to deploy with the African Development Bank to accelerate investments in healthcare systems, particularly in personnel training, digitalization, and resilience of health infrastructure?
Diene Keita: The document signed today lays the foundation for a structured mechanism of large-scale financing.
The challenge is to mobilize all stakeholders: African states, international partners, foundations, private investors, as well as all available innovative financing instruments.
The idea is to pool these resources around a single objective: addressing health, education, training, and infrastructure development in an integrated manner.
It also involves acting on what we call the “last mile”, effectively bringing essential services closer to women who need them most.
Digitalization, reliable data collection, territorial planning, and enhancing the skills of health personnel will be integral to this approach. Only under these conditions can we build resilient, inclusive healthcare systems capable of sustainably supporting the continent’s economic transformation.
Financial Afrik: your final word?
Diene Keita: Thank you. I thank Financial Afrik for their interest in these major issues for the future of the continent. This partnership marks a new stage in accelerating African ambitions in human development.
