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Decades of investment in Africa’s electrification have delivered real gains, yet progress has been uneven and, in some of the continent’s largest economies, frustratingly slow. As governments and their international development partners redouble their efforts, a critical question emerges: what can Africa’s own electrification trajectory, and the experience of regions that have moved faster, teach us about what it takes to sustain momentum?
In new research, we examine Africa’s journey on the path of electrification and surface a previously overlooked lesson about the role of local governments. Pursuing electricity access for its own sake is not enough to reduce poverty: a much broader constellation of policy actions is needed — and this is precisely where local governments play a role that is both crucial and unavoidable.
African countries show far more variation in their trajectories than countries in other regions. Nigeria and South Africa, two of the continent’s largest economies, stand out for going in circles: their electrification and income levels in 2022 were roughly where they were in 2010, even as peers in East Asia like Vietnam and Indonesia made steady progress. Countries in South Asia, despite starting at lower per capita income levels, moved towards universal electricity access more rapidly and consistently than countries in Africa.
Africa is an outlier on poverty, not just electricity access
The picture shifts when we look at poverty. Using World Development Indicators (WDI) data, Figure 2 shows that African countries are striking outliers not only on electricity access but also on the scale of poverty. This complicates the comparison with South Asia: South Asia may have started poorer in terms of GDP, but the depth and breadth of poverty in Africa likely helps explain its slower progress on electrification.
Each bubble in Figure 2 is sized by population, reflecting that East and South Asia have significantly larger populations. The paper examines how current electrification efforts in Africa rely on small-scale, low-cost, distributed energy systems suited to the continent’s conditions of widespread poverty and low population densities. However, technical innovation alone may not be enough.
When electrification trajectories are tracked alongside poverty trends (again using WDI data), a troubling pattern emerges — countries like Kenya and Zambia have seen poverty rise even as electricity access rates increase (Figure 3).
The economic and political challenge of electrifying Africa
Africa faces a fundamental bind: poverty is too widespread, and state revenues too low to cover the costs of electrification. The only way out is to borrow from future growth – investing in electricity today to raise incomes tomorrow, while building the tax and tariff base needed to repay those investments. This requires fiscal and political reform: stronger incentives for governments to invest public resources productively, and sufficient citizen trust in the state to make borrowing credible. Without that trust, governments cannot credibly signal to markets that cost-recovery through tariffs and taxation is achievable.
Learning from China’s approach
Country case studies point to China as a standout success. Its approach centered on using electricity to drive local economic growth, not just expand access, and it relied on local governments to plan electrification using their knowledge of local conditions and embeddedness in communities. Evidence reviewed in the paper suggests this model can be adapted to African contexts.
Strategic reforms of local government are needed
Local governments in Africa have largely been either starved of fiscal resources as countries remain centralized or purposed largely for delivering basic services in health and education with little encouragement to pursue local economic growth. Reformers could pursue a China-style strategy of empowering local governments to drive growth through expanding electrification. Local governments could also take on management of energy subsidies for poor households, separating that function from tariff-setting and helping restore utility viability.
For both roles to work, existing local electoral institutions across Africa must generate the right incentives for elected leaders. Although these institutions are already in place — local politicians have both information and agency — how that agency is used, whether positively or negatively, requires thoughtful consideration. Well-designed communication interventions can help shift incentives and trust in directions that allow Africa to accelerate progress on electrification and growth.
read more: https://blogs.worldbank.org/en/developmenttalk/what-africa-can-learn-from-the-world-s-electrification-champions
