United States’ nominee for World Bank Group President, Ajay Banga began his global tour on Monday, with his first stop in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire where he met the African Development Bank (http://www.AfDB.org) Group President Dr Akinwumi Adesina, senior management and Board of Directors.
Banga spoke about the need for the World Bank Group to develop a strong partnership with the African Development Bank Group that would help deliver transformative results.
The candidate for the World Bank top job highlighted three major issues affecting many parts of the world, which he said were of significant concern to him. He said these were inequality, tension between humanity and nature, and the tendency to apply short-term solutions to long-term problems which only delivers poor results. Banga said the challenges facing the world got complicated because of the Covid 19 pandemic, environmental degradation, and the impact of the Russia-Ukraine War.
The former Mastercard CEO emphasized the role of technology in helping to tackle challenges facing the world. He also talked about the role of the private sector in mobilizing much-needed capital resources for significant economic development. He said this applied both to private sector capital, as well as to private sector ingenuity and innovation, which are needed to tackle the many challenges facing the world.
Adesina said Banga’s call for a regenerated partnership resonated with him. He stressed the need for a new way of working between the World Bank and the African Development Bank. “It is more than financial. It’s more about how we work to optimize resources by engaging governments, the private sector, and other stakeholders to deliver meaningful change.”
Adesina said climate change remained the most serious existential threat to humanity. “Climate change is decimating lives, displacing people, creating refugees and deepening poverty,” he stressed.
He warned: “It is what I call the triangle of disaster. You have increasing poverty, rising youth unemployment and environmental degradation, and this is breeding ground for terrorism.”
The African Development Bank head called for a global security council on environment and biodiversity, issues which he said were not getting the attention they deserved, compared to other global challenges such as war.
Adesina called for a new way of measuring the wealth of nations instead of basing it on gross domestic product. “This does not consider important factors like a country’s contribution to carbon emission and impact on biodiversity.”
