Climate Finance Accelerator (CFA) South Africa

The Climate Finance Accelerator (CFA) is a global technical assistance programme funded by the UK government to support climate smart projects to access finance. The CFA operates in ten countries (Nigeria, Colombia, South Africa, Egypt, Uganda, Türkiye, Mexico, Peru, Pakistan and Viet Nam) with the aim of encouraging the flows of finance required to deliver on countries’ ambition to limit global warming to 1.5°C.

In South Africa, the CFA brings together the key actors in the climate finance investment chain: project proponents and developers, finance providers, and policymakers. Our aim is to facilitate a collaborative approach to unlocking finance for climate projects at scale and creating a pipeline of ‘investment ready’ low carbon projects. The CFA also seeks to deliver several co-benefits, such as supporting a just transition through green economy efforts that include inclusive approaches to sustainable development, improved social transformation, and building resilience to climate impacts.

How the CFA South Africa can support your project

The CFA is a practical and deal-oriented programme that supports climate projects to improve their bankability and appeal to financiers. Preparing projects that are attractive to investors is challenging. Low carbon projects are often perceived as higher risk as new technologies and business models are not widely understood. Regulatory and policy barriers can also create blockages in accessing capital at scale.

The CFA offers a range of capacity building support to assist climate mitigation projects in accessing finance. By engaging with the CFA programme, project developers can benefit from:

• Access to investors: The CFA provides project developers greater opportunities to access finance by working with potential investors to understand their needs. Through the CFA’s reach, project proponents have the opportunity to engage with commercial and concessional investors, operating both nationally and internationally. It is important to note that the CFA Programme does NOT provide direct financial/monetary support to projects but rather capacity building and access to financiers. In the past, access to financiers through the CFA Programme in South Africa has resulted in deals, but this is not guaranteed.
• Coaching, capacity building and best practice insights: The CFA provides access to expert insight, awareness training, coaching and mentorship. Through knowledge sharing sessions on what matters most to financiers when making the decision to invest, project developers will gain valuable insights and develop capabilities in making projects attractive and investment ready. For example, the CFA will advise on the development of key materials such as pitch decks for investors and marketing presentations. Another example is providing Gender Equity and Social Inclusion capacity building, so that investors may appreciate the societal impact of the project.
• Networking opportunities: Project developers will have the opportunity to expand their network with investors and other key stakeholders in the climate finance landscape. These include government representatives at national and local level, national and international development banks and agencies, and a cohort of projects looking to improve their bankability. The network will provide project developers with long-lasting benefits to current and future low carbon opportunities.
• Increased visibility: Participation in the CFA and CFA events can raise the profile of a project amongst a range of stakeholders from regional and national policy makers, through to local and international finance providers.
• Achieving low ESG (Environment, Social and Governance) project objectives: The CFA supports projects to realise and communicate their positive impacts, which are important to investors alongside commercial objectives. The CFA has access to climate, sectoral and social impact specialists and can assist projects to support local and national climate ambitions, as well as helping to unlock co-benefits such as poverty reduction, improved gender equality and social inclusion, and tackling biodiversity loss.

The type of projects the CFA can support

The CFA supports low carbon projects that are seeking finance. Candidate projects should:

• Be designed to achieve measurable climate outcomes in terms of direct or facilitated greenhouse gas emission reductions.
• Have a minimum total financing need of US$4M.
• Be (at least) at the technical pre-feasibility stage of development.​​​​​​
• Have a business model that will generate commercially attractive and sustainable returns in the long-term (although some element of concessional financing may be required initially).
• We strongly encourage projects that can demonstrate positive social impacts and how they contribute to furthering gender equality and social inclusion (including financial inclusion for marginalised social groups).
• Sound governance, leadership and management of the project, including systems to monitor and measure progress against stated targets and goals.

How to apply

The CFA is open for applications from climate projects seeking support in accessing finance until 17 November 2023.

The application and submission requirements can be by accessed here. Please note that the application process is not designed to select the most developed or complete projects, but rather those that are aligned with our objective of facilitating climate projects in line with South Africa’s Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) to access finance. Projects that meet the criteria above are strongly encouraged to apply.

To find out more information about how your organisation can benefit from engaging with the CFA programme email: southafrica@climatefinanceaccelerator.co.uk.