Japan’s Senior Deputy-Minister of Finance, Yukihisa Fujita, announced at the recent African Development Bank’s (AfDB) Annual Meeting, the Japanese government’s intention to provide another US$ one billion over the next five years for a second phase of the Enhanced Private Sector Assistance (EPSA) for Africa Initiative.

Yukihisa made the announcement during a joint session with AfDB President, Donald Kaberuka, and President of the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), Akihiko Tanaka.  
Speaking at the joint session Fujita said that, “in Africa, we understand that private sector-led growth has been progressing well in various sectors, in addition to mineral resources. In order to promote poverty-reduction through accelerating this movement, in 2005 Japan launched the EPSA initiative jointly with the AfDB. Today, I am privileged to announce that Japan decided to provide an additional one billion USD in Yen loans over the next five years.” Japan has funded US$ 1 billion for the first round of EPSA, a target set at the Gleneagles G8 Summit in 2005.
AfDB President Kaberuka thanked the Japanese Government for their continued support, especially in times of fiscal austerity, and celebrated the impact of EPSA to date. “EPSA has played a key role in the development of regional infrastructure critical to sustaining African economic growth. It has helped to turbo-charge the AfDB’s private sector operations, which have taken a quantum leap forward, expanding nearly ten-fold over the lifespan of the first phase of EPSA. And it is building capacity for future growth through technical assistance and training for African enterprises and financial institutions supported by the Fund for African Private Sector Assistance” President Kaberuka said.
During the first five years of EPSA more than 70 projects were launched, leveraging an additional US$ 1.2 billion of AfDB financing with the potential to touch the lives of all Africans. In his statement, JICA President Tanaka noted that, “to achieve sustainable growth in Africa it will be crucial to strengthen industrial development and expand resource capacity. The private sector will be a major engine for such expansion. Using the EPSA framework, JICA and the AfDB will therefore co-finance further infrastructure development including in the transport and energy sectors and provide financial support to private sector activities.“