EU-Africa relations

28 March 2014
by eub2 -- last modified 30 November 2017

On 29/30 November the EU and Africa strengthened their long-standing partnership at the 5th African Union - European Union Summit, in Abidjan Cote D'Ivoire.

• €31 BILLION IN OFFICIAL DEVELOPMENT AID 2014-2020 (EU COMMISSION)
• €680 MILLION SUPPORT TO ENHANCE TRADE BETWEEN AFRICA AND THE EU (2014-2016)
• 18.2 MILLION PEOPLE GIVEN ACCESS TO ENERGY THANKS TO EU SUPPORT

THE EU AND AFRICA – KEY PARTNERS

The EU is Africa's main partner, working together to tackle the common challenges of today, from investing in youth, fostering sustainable development and strengthening peace and security to boosting investment in the African continent, good governance and better managing migration.

PARTNERS IN TRADE AND INVESTMENT TO CREATE JOBS

• Through its new External Investment Plan, the EU will help to attract private investments for sustainable development of up to €44 billion in Africa.
• In 2015, European companies invested €31billion in African economies, and the total stock of Foreign Direct Investments from the EU in Africa amounted to €294 billion.
• 32.7% of total African imports and 41.1% of African exports; 35.9% of Africa's trade (import and exports) takes place with the EU.
• The European Investment Bank has invested over €20 billion in more than 330 public and private sector projects in Africa.
• The EU is Africa's biggest partner for sustainable energy, with €2.7 billion for Sub-Saharan Africa (2014-2020). And it pays out: 18.2 million people have been given access to energy thanks to EU support.
• The EU and its Member States are the biggest contributors of climate finance to developing countries, having provided €20.2 billion in 2016 alone. A major part of this was benefiting African partners.

The External Investment Plan provides a state of the art framework to improve sustainable investments in Africa and the European Neighbourhood. It will support innovative financial instruments such as guarantees to boost private investment. With an input of €4.1 billion from the EU, it will enable to mobilise up to €44 billion of private investments.

Such investments will mainly be targeted on improving social and economic infrastructure, for example municipal infrastructure and proximity services, on providing support to Small and Medium-sized enterprises, and on microfinance and job creation projects, in particular for young people.

• €4.1 billion from the EU budget
• €44 billion from External Investment Plan
• Total: €88 billion if the Member States and partners match the EU’s contribution

PARTNERS TO BOOST KNOWLEDGE AND SKILLS

• Africa has the youngest population in the world: 41% under 15 years, 60% under 25 years. The EU supports their education and vocational training with €1.34 billion (2014-2020).
• Almost 8.5 million children have been enrolled in primary and secondary education as a result of EU programmes (2013-2016).
• 53,560 people in Africa have benefited from education and vocational training, skills development and other active labour market programmes with EU support between 2014 and 2016.
• 15,400 teachers have been trained thanks to EU support (2014-2016).

PARTNERS TO BETTER MANAGE MIGRATION AND MOBILITY

• Most migration takes place inside Africa: Around 16 million African migrants are living in Africa, while 9 million are living in the EU.
• In 2015, €21 billion of remittances from African expats in Europe have been sent from the EU to Africa, representing over a third of all global remittances.
• More than 8 million trips (business + leisure) from Europeans to Africa per year.
• The common priority of the EU and Africa is to save lives, fight traffickers, create legal pathways to Europe and create economic opportunities for people on the ground. The EU has established a dedicated Trust Fund worth €3.2 billion, which addresses the root causes of irregular migration.
• To address root causes through long-term development, the EU and its Member States together provide €20 billion a year in Official Development Assistance to Africa.

PARTNERS FOR PEACE AND SECURITY

• The EU has supported 14 Peace Support Operations in 18 different countries in Africa.
• The EU has helped to significantly reduce piracy in the Horn of Africa through its military mission NAVFOR ATALANTA.
• The EU's missions in Africa have trained 30,000 military, police and judiciary personnel.
• 192,120 persons directly benefited from EU-supported programmes for civilian post-conflict peace building and conflict prevention (between 2013 and 2014).
• The EU supported 14 Peace Support Operations in 18 different countries.
• The EU is the first supporter of the efforts of the G5 Sahel countries to improve security and cross border cooperation in the region, with €50 million.
• So far, the EU has provided more than €1.3 billion to AMISOM, the African Union mission in Somalia, making it the main contributor.

PARTNERS TO STRENGTHEN GOVERNANCE AND RULE OF LAW

• 129 EU Election Observation Missions and Election Expert Missions have been deployed in Africa since 2000. In the last two years, there have been seven EU Election Observation Missions in Gambia, Kenya, Liberia, Gabon, Zambia, Ghana and Uganda as well as one Election Experts Mission in Somalia.
• 2,930 Human Rights Defenders have received EU support (between 2013 and 2014).
• EU holds annual human rights dialogues with many African partners, discussing jointly efforts to boost good governance and the rule of law.