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AFD Group Annual Meetings: stronger partnerships to face challenges together
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AFD Group’s Annual Meetings, held from January 6 to 10 in Paris, brought together agency directors from across the world, representatives of the French government, researchers, economists, and leaders from institutions and businesses. These meetings provided an opportunity to reaffirm the importance of international cooperation in an uncertain global context and to sign new agreements with partners.
Annual Meetings 2025
As every year in January, AFD Group's Annual Meetings serve as a moment to review the past year’s achievements, discuss economic, environmental, and social challenges, and set the course for future actions. To start 2025, the event’s theme, “Geopolitics and Development,” emphasized strengthening the group’s strategy and partnerships.
In his opening remarks, AFD Group CEO Rémy Rioux spoke about the power of multilateralism and unifying occasions in this period of uncertainty, when global balances are in upheaval and France’s international action is undergoing transformation:
“Since 2016, multilateralism has proven its resilience. The 200 or so multilateral organizations now account for more than 50% of total official development assistance. The UN Member States have worked hard over the past decade to maintain this crucial network of institutions and programs.”
He also stressed the urgency and importance of jointly considering the international and national facets of issues and the need to redefine multilateralism, which he believes must move to a new level in 2025, the year of the 10th anniversary of the Sustainable Development Goals and the Paris Agreement:
“We’ve been anticipating this shift since 2020, through Finance in Common (FiCS), whose 5th summit will be held in Cape Town at the end of February. FiCS will also play a significant role in the 4th International Conference on Financing for Development in Seville in July and at COP 30 in Belém in November.”
Read the research paper “Double Standards in Financing for Development”.
French public institutions in the spotlight
Among AFD’s partners, the French Public Institutions (EPF) community plays a key role in the implementation of public policies. Around thirty representatives of these institutions attended the Annual Meetings to reaffirm their commitment to a “World in Common” and their dedication to leveraging their expertise in support of public investment policies for sustainable and inclusive development.
According to Frédéric Audras, Head of the Territories and Enterprises Division, “AFD is unique within the development finance ecosystem because it is deeply embedded in this EPF network, which develops tools and resources for sustainable development. We must continuously learn from these tools while also drawing inspiration from best practices abroad. We discussed issues such as coastal erosion and urban development, where we could learn from our partner countries and apply those insights in France.”
Between 2019 and 2024, the mobilization of French public expertise through EPFs in AFD Group operations represented €160 million in commitments across 54 projects. Some key projects include:
- Co-financing the Digital Energy Facility with the French Agency for Ecological Transition (ADEME)
- The “Academia Partnerships Africa-France” (PeA) program with the French National Research Agency (ARN)
- Health projects with Rennes University Hospital
- The TSARA initiative with the French agricultural research and international cooperation organization (CIRAD) and France’s National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment (INRAE)
At the conclusion of the event, a joint statement was signed by several French public institutions and AFD Group, reaffirming their collaboration in support of the Sustainable Development Goals.
A renewed partnership with ADEME
This gathering of French public institutions also provided the occasion to renew our partnership with the French Agency for Ecological Transition (ADEME) over the next five years, encompassing the entire AFD Group for the first time. This collaboration will cover sustainable energy, the circular economy, waste management and plastic pollution reduction, climate change adaptation, sustainable finance, and business transition.
For Rémy Rioux, “The challenge of a just ecological transition presents an opportunity to rethink our development models. This new agreement with Ademe strengthens a relationship of trust and collaboration, now extended to the entire AFD Group. Together, we are pooling our expertise and resources to accelerate the transition in overseas territories and developing countries.”
A health agreement focused on overseas territories
On January 9, AFD Group and the Red Cross signed a project agreement to establish platforms that will significantly enhance national and international health intervention capacities across the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic Ocean basins.
During this event, Manuel Valls, French Minister of State for Overseas Territories, described AFD as “an essential player in helping Overseas Territories develop within their regional zones,” and called for radical reform in those facing particular challenges, such as Mayotte and New Caledonia. These territories “must find their own development trajectories,” he added, while praising AFD Group’s Three Oceans initiative, which focuses on the Indian, Atlantic, and Pacific Oceans.
AFD Group’s multilateral convergence approach is exemplified in this agreement with the Red Cross, benefiting the healthcare systems of both French overseas territories and their neighboring regions.