EU-Africa Summit 2022

On 17th and 18th of February, the African Union (AU) and the European Union (EU) met for the long-awaited summit. But since the event was planned back in 2020, the world has been ravaged by a pandemic that has stalled a decade of continuous growth and human capital improvement on the African continent.

It is becoming increasingly clear that Europe’s future wellbeing will depend more and more on the future wellbeing of its closest neighbour, Africa. So, can this summit still do what it originally set out to—and what it must set a course for— and reset the EU’s relationship with Africa as a “true partnership of equals”?

In this blog series, CGD colleagues present proposals on the joint priorities set out by the AU and the EU and offer commentary on whether a meaningful reconstruction of the relationships between the two continents is likely to materialise.

More from the Series

Blog Post

The EU Should Build Skills in Africa, Not Just Promote Mobility

January 26, 2022
The European Union's New Pact on Migration and Asylum, published in 2020, aimed to implement “Talent Partnerships” with African countries, to better link migration and skills development. Since then, much progress has been made, but there is still further to go. This blog outline...
Blog Post

Afro-European Partnerships in Health: Accelerating Better Efficiency of Health Spending

January 20, 2022
In the wake of the COVID-19 crisis, many sub-Saharan African countries will face serious economic crises and shrinking public spending. If countries are unable to spend more, they need to spend better. Europe has leading expertise in building institutions for priority-setting in health, making it an...
Blog Post

Good News: Africa Needs More Jobs While Europe Needs More Workers

January 19, 2022
We look at the challenges that Europe faces with an aging population, and ask if the challenges that Africa faces with a burgeoning working-age population might be a mutually beneficial part of the answer. We think they might, but the scale of migration under “business as usual” is grossly...
Blog Post

The Make or Break EU-Africa Summit

January 13, 2022
In the run up to the start of a long-awaited summit between the African Union (AU) and the European Union (EU), CGD colleagues will be setting out their thoughts on what needs to happen for the relationship between the two contintents to be reset as a “true partnership of eq...