Boost Africa program impact empowers startups with funding, skills, and networks, transforming women and youth enterprises across Africa.
In Kenya and Africa in general, entrepreneurship is the engine of transformation. But we must acknowledge that while ideas abound and ambition thrives, access to capital, skills, and networks have remained a stubborn hurdle for innovators, especially for women-led enterprises.
The European Investment Bank’s Boost Africa program, in collaboration with the African Development Bank and other partners, is directly addressing this challenge, giving African startups a thread to hang on to and a step to kickstart and grow their ventures. It bridges funding gaps in the African market by providing early-stage venture capital paired with technical skills development for both Fund Managers and the beneficiary companies that they invest in.
Boost Africa is a catalytic empowerment framework that combines financial capital with human capital capacity building to ensure that especially female and young entrepreneurs and fund managers can overcome the structural obstacles that often derail promising enterprises, with a major focus on ICT, agribusiness, financial inclusion, health, education, and renewable energy.
But Boost Africa’s real uniqueness lies in its people-centered approach, designed not just to scale businesses but to create ecosystems that are inclusive, resilient, and future-focused.
Boost Africa has effectively de-risked investments in Africa by structuring a junior tranche, which basically means EIB commits to taking on any losses when investing in private equity funds supporting African businesses. This encourages other public and private investors to mobilise funds to Africa’s enterprises, as they are shielded from any risk by the EIB.
There is no doubt that Africa has seen empowerment programs before, from microfinance schemes in rural Kenya to digital inclusion drives in West Africa. These initiatives proved one thing: when women are empowered, communities flourish. Consider the Grameen-inspired microcredit projects that enabled thousands of rural women to run small businesses, or more recently, mobile money revolutions like M-Pesa that gave women control over financial decision-making.
Private capital is a powerful driver of Africa’s development and attracting more international finance into Africa is essential to developing its venture capital sector. The Boost Africa programme is providing patient capital that understands longer investment cycles unlike short-term cycles in developed markets.
Poa Internet, a Startup in Kenya with funding from Boost Africa, that has played a major role in enhancing internet inclusion among poor and vulnerable households in Kenya’s informal settlements, has benefited many of the women. We will be taking a more in-depth look at Poa Pay in a later article.
Take Shamba Pride, another Boost Africa-supported venture that has digitized agro-dealerships and connected over 100,000 farmers to services. The initiative equips women farmers with new technologies, fair prices and new markets. This directly enhances household income, food security, and women’s leadership in agribusiness. When families grow, communities grow.
Equally vital in Boost Africa’s journey is education and technology, with an example of KaiOS which is bridging the digital divide through affordable phones with the support of Boost Africa. This is putting internet-enabled tools in the hands of millions, including women in rural and underserved areas. Such interventions multiply women’s opportunities from accessing e-learning platforms to engaging in digital entrepreneurship which is quite on the rise now.
In the end, Boost Africa is a catalyst for inclusive prosperity that weaves together capital, skills, and networks and dismantles long-standing barriers that have kept women and youth on the margins of Africa’s entrepreneurial story.
If Africa is to fully harness its demographic dividend and position itself as a global hub of innovation, then programs like Boost Africa are not optional; they are essential.
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