Africa faces extreme weather events and climate impacts, from droughts and floods to growing threats to food, water and energy security. These challenges make climate action a cornerstone of Africa’s development and resilience. Over the past decade, African countries have strengthened their existing nationally determined contributions (NDCs) and submitted new NDCs, but implementation still lags, with only about 11% of the continent’s annual climate-finance need currently met.
Many African NDCs remain broad policy frameworks, with limited translation of targets into actionable, investment-ready plans. Coordination across national ministries continues to be limited, project pipelines are thin, and enabling environments remain constrained. Persistent tensions between economic and climate priorities, together with limited monitoring and investment planning capacity, have further slowed implementation. The result is that climate goals too often remain aspirations rather than investable strategies.
Recognising this challenge, the African Climate Foundation (ACF), with support from Dalberg, developed the NDC Investment Planner (NIP) to bridge the gap between ambition and investment. The NIP provides a structured, iterative process that brings investment logic into climate planning. It enables countries to identify high-potential NDC opportunities, evaluate their economic and financial attractiveness and prioritise actions that can move from conceptual to investment phase.
You can also watch the full webinar launch and discussion of this report here.
