Here are the 10 countries with the highest and lowest electrification rates in Africa

The African Development Bank (AfDB), in its Annual Review of Development Effectiveness (ADER), reports significant progress in electrification of the African continent with an electrification rate that has increased from 42% in 2015 to 56% in 2021. However, the upcoming 2022 edition”Track Goal 7: Energy Progress Report“(The Monitoring Report Dedicated to Progress on Sustainable Development Goal 7) of the World Bank has just shown Africa’s massive lag in terms of electricity.

According to the report’s data, 733 million people globally do not have access to electricity, including 568 million Africans. This means that Africa has 77.50% of people without access to electricity in the world in 2020, compared to 71% in 2018, while at the global level, 91% of the population has access to electricity. Thus, the situation has not improved in recent years, especially in 2020 due to the Covid-19 epidemic, disruptions in global supply chains and the reallocation of some tax resources to related expenditures to the rise in food products and hydrocarbons. The situation is expected to worsen this year with the energy crisis resulting from the war in Ukraine.

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In addition, the report notes that “international public finance flows to developing countries to promote clean energy declined for the second year in a row. It reached $10.9 billion in 2019, despite the enormous needs for sustainable development in most countries and the growing urgency of climate change.” This amount decreased by approximately 24% compared to the previous year.”

With 568 million people without access to electricity, Africa is by far the least electrified continent. However, there are significant differences between regions and countries. In sub-Saharan Africa we observe the lowest rate of electrification. This region alone has 77% of the world’s population without electricity. On the other hand, North African countries show electrification rates of close to 100%. This is the case in Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria, each with 100% electrification rates. Libya’s electrification rate continues to drop from 100% in 2000 to 70% in 2020 due to the civil war.

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In sub-Saharan Africa, the electrification rate increased from 46% in 2018 to 48% in 2020, although its status has deteriorated globally. However, there are huge differences in this area. The best electricity rates can be attributed to Mauritius (100%), Seychelles (100%), Cape Verde (94%), Gabon (92%), Comoros (87%), Ghana (86%), South Africa (84%) and Eswatini (80%). ), Botswana (72%), Kenya (71%), Côte d’Ivoire (70%), Senegal (70%) and Libya (70%).

Here are the 10 countries with the most and least electricity in Africa

nation	electrification rate	nation	electrification rate
Algeria	100%	South Sudan	7%
Egypt	100%	Chad	11%
The Kingdom of Morocco	100%	Burundi	12%
Mauritius	100%	Malawi	15th%
Seychelles	100%	Central African Republic	15th%
Tunisia	100%	Burkina Faso	19%
green head	94%	Democratic Republic of the Congo	19%
Gabon	92%	Niger	19%
Comoros	87%	Sierra Leone	26%
Ghana	86%	Liberia	28%

The countries with the largest number of people without electricity are Nigeria (92 million), the Democratic Republic of the Congo (72 million), Ethiopia (56 million), Tanzania (36 million) and Uganda (26 million).

South Sudan is the country with the lowest electrification rate in the world with less than 8% of the population having access to electricity, despite being an oil producer. The civil war ravaging the country has a lot to do with it.

Chad (11%), Burundi (12%), Malawi (15%), Burkina Faso (19%), Democratic Republic of the Congo (19%) and Niger (19%) have electrification rates below 20%. As for Nigeria, the leading economic power on the continent, its electrification rate is around 45%, which puts it just below Ethiopia (49%). We note that the main oil producers on the continent have low electrification rates, including Nigeria (45%), Angola (47%), Chad (11%), South Sudan (7%), etc.

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It is clear that universal access to electricity by 2030, the seventh goal of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, will not be achieved on the continent.

However, Africa has all the assets that allow all of its inhabitants to have access to electricity. In addition to important fossil resources (oil, gas, coal, etc.), the continent has the potential to develop renewable energies (wind, solar, geothermal, hydropower, etc.) without joint action with other continents.10