Moliehi Mafantiri presented Fair Share: How Much and How It Is Structured at a webinar hosted by the Africa Just Transition Network (AJTN), as part of its Climate Finance for a Just Energy Transition Capacity Building Webinar Series. The presentation examines how Africa can secure its fair share of global climate finance and ensure funding supports a just, equitable and worker-centred transition.
Securing Africa’s fair share of climate finance
Drawing on the IEJ’s 2025 Worker-Centred Framework for Financing the Just Transition, the presentation argues that climate finance must be assessed not only by the amount mobilised, but also by its terms, ownership structures, distribution of risk and public accountability.
South Africa’s climate-finance landscape reveals growing inflows dominated by private debt, limited grant funding and development finance, and an emphasis on energy over adaptation. With annual financing needs projected to reach R499 billion, high borrowing costs, currency mismatches and hidden expenses further constrain the transition.
Governing private and blended finance
The presentation highlights how blended-finance arrangements can transfer risks to the public sector while concentrating profits and ownership in private hands. It calls for stronger regulation, green-finance taxonomies, safeguards against carbon-capital arbitrage, and worker- and community-centred protections that address labour impacts, local benefits and gender equality.
Proposed monetary reforms include expanding the South African Reserve Bank’s mandate to encompass employment and green transformation, introducing differentiated capital requirements for green finance, and directing credit towards transition-aligned sectors.
Mobilising domestic public finance
A proposed Climate Response Fund (CRF), targeting approximately R100 billion annually, would mobilise domestic revenue through carbon pricing, fuel levies, royalties and fiscal reforms. Carbon pricing should support emissions reduction while protecting households from disproportionate costs.
The presentation also calls for strengthening development finance institutions, particularly the Industrial Development Corporation, to provide patient, long-term capital under democratic public governance.
Conclusion
Africa-wide climate finance principles should include transparent climate-risk reporting, credible carbon pricing, standing climate funds, reformed development finance institutions and international partnerships that prioritise grants and affordable concessional finance while protecting public ownership and ensuring benefits reach workers and communities.