Event report
Breakfast Meeting with AFD & Proparco
French Chamber Partners formally present their projects to members.
We held our 1st breakfast meeting with our partners from Agence Française de Développement (AFD) and Proparco where the French Chamber members spent their morning learning about the projects that the two companies do across East Africa region especially in the Private Sector.
Hélène N'Garmim-Ganga, Regional Director East Africa at AFD kick started the session by giving a brief introduction of the companies. She mentioned that Agence Française de Développement (AFD) work with over 150+ countries worldwide and run over 4200 projects both with the Private Sector and the government institutions.
She went ahead to Introduced Proparco as one of subsidiary of the AFD Group which focused on private sector development that provide financial support for businesses and financial institutions.
Bertrand Willocquet, Country Director Kenya at AFD took the stage to expound more on some projects that AFD have both locally and internationally. Some of these major activities in Kenya include Supporting energy transition, finance projects of public companies like KenGen, Kenya Power, Ketraco or GDC as well as private actors through the SUNREF program aimed at the development of ENR, improving energy efficiency and reducing consumption. He also mentioned some of the new projects they are working on such Masinga Dam (2024) and Marsabit Wind (2025).
He continued by saying as a way of expanding, AFD is trying to find partnership across Kenya. Some of the partners they are working with on the technical and Higher Education projects include the University of Nairobi, AFD is also working on rehabilitation of Meru Park. Other activities AFD does include Support Development infrastructure that focuses on Airport Improvements which partner with Kenya Airport Authority.
Antoine Burgard, Proparco lent his expertise by giving a brief insight on Proparco. He went ahead and explained their operations across East Africa region such is to provide funding and support to both businesses and financial institutions. They majorly work with Small Medium Enterprises (SMEs), Key Credentials like Naivas Supermarket, Equity Bank, Goodlife among others.
The meeting ended with a great networking session among the members in attendance! We look forward to further engagement.
