Transforming African mobility will require the elimination of GHG-emitting vehicles; with the right partnerships in place, can African cities spearhead this transformation globally?

Africa needs much more vehicle transport on its road to prosperity. Transport investments will determine whether Africa heads towards an inequitable, carbon-heavy development trap or a much more equitable zero-carbon path. In this session, we explore how the aligning interests of public and private sectors in Africa present our cities with an opportunity to become global drivers of clean and equitable mobility.

Host: Transport for Cairo

Cairo, Egypt

Session Summary

Ahmed Alkady opens the session hosted by Transport for Cairo and introduces the moderator, Mohammed Hegazy, for this panel discussion. Mohammed introduces the title and asks the question “How do we electrify public transport in Africa?” The panel consisted of multiple stakeholders representing science, engineering, the public, projects and private companies.

Thomas Gereke is the first panellist to present the importance and need to look at the bigger picture of the end-users. Herman Kwoba, the second panellist, speaks about the modelling for the potential of mitigation that comes from e-mobility. The third panellist takes the floor, K. Charlen, and emphasizes that we need new low carbon vehicles, and we need to make them accessible. Throughout the webinar, polls were launched in order to get the feel of the attendees’ knowledge about electrical cars and their history. The last panellist of the webinar, Albin Wilson, began a start-up that builds e-mobility vehicles in Kenya and designs them for Africa, presented last.

Mohammed closes off the webinar with a recap of what was discussed by the panellists. He highlighted that there is a shift that needs to happen toward the creation of the roaming and mobility platforms and the drivers creating the shift towards electric cars. He ends by asking the panellists: What do you think is the first thing in the near future that will happen in terms of a project or an investment relating to electrified cars in Africa?