Dev´t partners launch expert network to reorient African economies.

Dubbed African Chief Economists Network, ACE-Network, he said the continent-wide platform is designed to strengthen evidence-based policymaking and provide coordinated African solutions to increasingly complex global economic challenges. 

Stressing that the establishment of the ACE-Network reflects growing recognition that African countries need stronger coordination among their leading economic thinkers as policymakers navigate increasingly interconnected global crises.

The network aims to fill that gap by creating an informal, invitation-only community of chief economists and senior policy advisers to exchange evidence, coordinate research, identify emerging risks, and jointly develop policy recommendations for African governments.

Members will include chief economists from African development finance institutions and multilateral organisations, chief economic advisers to African presidents and prime ministers, deputy governors of central banks responsible for economic policy, heads of leading think tanks, deans of economics faculties, and senior private-sector economists.

He clarified that rather than establishing another formal institution, the network will operate as a collaborative platform, meeting annually alongside the African Economic Conference and holding quarterly virtual sessions and rapid-response meetings during major global or regional economic shocks.

Strengthening Africa's knowledge sovereignty

Presenting the network's strategic vision, African Development Bank Group Chief Economist and Vice-President for Economic Governance and Knowledge Management, Prof Kevin Urama, said Africa must strengthen its knowledge systems if it is to shape the emerging global financial and economic order.

He argued that Africa has only a limited window to influence reforms at the level of the international financial architecture and that stronger coordination among African economists would help governments make better-informed decisions amid unprecedented uncertainty.

He announced that among the network's priorities are strengthening Africa's knowledge sovereignty, increasing investment in research and innovation, improving policy coordination, reducing duplication across institutions, enhancing early-warning systems for emerging risks, and ensuring that economic analysis better reflects African realities.

Urama also called for greater investment in what he described as "soft infrastructure"—research, data systems and knowledge institutions—to complement the continent's growing investment in transport, energy and other physical infrastructure.

Bridging research & policymaking

For the United Nations Development Programme, UNDP, a major development partner, the Network is a unified power house of intellectuals capable of narrowing the gap between economic research and public policy.

The UNDP Regional Bureau for Africa Chief Economist Dr Raymond Gilpin said the initiative would help African countries mobilise domestic capital, strengthen implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area, AfCFTA, develop innovative responses to climate and fiscal challenges, and convert Africa's demographic growth into a driver of long-term prosperity.

"The Africa Chief Economists Network will be an engine room that designs creative solutions necessary for Africa to attain the Sustainable Development Goals and the African Union's Agenda 2063," Gilpin said.

The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, UNECA, Deputy Executive Secretary and Chief Economist Dr Hanan Morsy said increasingly interconnected crises demanded stronger collective economic intelligence across Africa.

"No country, regardless of its size or resources, can effectively navigate this environment alone," she said, adding that the network's success would ultimately be measured by whether it improves policymaking, strengthens resilience and contributes to faster, more inclusive growth across the continent.

Representing the OECD, Ida McDonnell, head of the Development Research Unit, noted that current global challenges required integrated approaches to trade, debt, climate finance, industrial policy and investment, rather than treating each issue separately.

She added that the new ACE-Network would help reduce duplication while strengthening African contributions to global policy debates.

This article was first published in The Guardian Post Edition No:3847 of Tuesday July 14, 2026