Three African civil society organisations have welcomed the Nairobi Declaration adopted at the Africa Forward Summit while issuing pointed warnings that the continent’s green industrialisation agenda risks reproducing extractive economic models unless frontline communities are placed at the centre of implementation.
African leaders and France adopted the Africa Forward Summit Declaration on May 12, 2026, outlining a renewed partnership focused on inclusive growth, innovation, peace, sustainable development and mutual prosperity. The document was endorsed at the conclusion of the two-day summit co-hosted by Kenya and France. The summit generated over EUR 23 billion in announced investment commitments, partnerships, and commercial agreements across energy, infrastructure, manufacturing, agribusiness, financial services, digital innovation, and logistics.
In a joint response issued after the summit, the African Coalition of Communities Responsive to Climate Change (ACCRCC) in Nairobi, Shine Collab in Harare, and Pragmatic Social Action in Uganda welcomed commitments to renewable energy expansion, clean cooking, green industrialisation, and fair climate financing. However, they raised concerns that without stronger community safeguards, the ambitions embedded in the declaration could deepen rather than reverse historical inequalities.
“Development financing must prioritise human wellbeing over profit maximisation,” the three organisations stated in their joint response.
The groups warned specifically that Africa’s critical minerals, renewable energy resources, forests, and biodiversity risk becoming the foundation of a new cycle of exploitation carried out under the banner of green development. They called for stronger protections for Indigenous land rights and ecological systems, and demanded that climate financing be channelled directly to grassroots communities rather than concentrated in large-scale infrastructure projects that often displace vulnerable populations.
At the heart of the Nairobi Declaration was a commitment to support a transition from extractive economic models toward value addition, manufacturing, and sustainable production systems. The civil society groups acknowledged that language but argued the implementation architecture must match the rhetoric by ensuring communities hold ownership stakes in energy and industrial projects rather than absorbing their costs.
The joint response also pressed for increased grant-based climate finance, the full operationalisation of the global Loss and Damage Fund, and debt relief linked to climate vulnerability. The groups criticised what they described as insufficient attention to climate justice within the declaration, arguing that Africa, which contributes minimally to global greenhouse gas emissions, continues to bear disproportionate consequences through droughts, floods, food insecurity, and forced displacement.
On agriculture, the organisations supported commitments to climate-smart farming and local value chains but cautioned against industrial agribusiness models that marginalise smallholder farmers and Indigenous food systems. On artificial intelligence (AI), they welcomed the summit’s attention to African digital sovereignty and local AI development but raised concerns about surveillance risks, data exploitation, and digital exclusion if rights-based governance frameworks are not put in place.
The organisations also weighed in on debt and global financial reform. Africa faces debt servicing costs of nearly $90 billion in external payments in 2026 alone, with countries including Ghana, Kenya, and Zambia devoting between 30 and 50 percent of government revenues to debt servicing, amounts that exceed the combined health and education budgets of most African nations. The civil society groups acknowledged the declaration’s support for International Monetary Fund (IMF) reforms and fairer African representation in global financial institutions, but argued that structural inequalities in trade, taxation, and illicit financial flows continue to undermine Africa’s development prospects.
The Africa Forward Summit declaration committed to building partnerships of equals between Africa and France. The three civil society organisations said genuine equality requires transparency, community participation, and fair trade relations beyond diplomatic language.
The Nairobi Declaration’s agenda is expected to be championed by France and Kenya at the G7 Summit in Évian-les-Bains on June 15 to 17, 2026. The civil society groups said they remain ready to collaborate with governments and regional bodies to advance a climate-resilient, economically sovereign, and socially just Africa, provided implementation moves beyond declarations toward accountable delivery.
