Proparco Signs $30M Senior Credit Facility with Sterling Bank

LAGOS — Proparco, the private-sector financing arm of Agence Française de Développement (AFD Group), has executed a $30.0 million (~NGN 49.5 billion) senior credit facility agreement with Nigerian commercial lender Sterling Bank.

The loan agreement was officially signed at Sterling Bank’s corporate headquarters in Lagos by Abubakar Suleiman, Managing Director and CEO of Sterling Bank, and Christophe Lecourtier, Chief Executive Officer of AFD.

The transaction represents the initial phase of a multi-year strategic debt partnership between Proparco and Sterling Bank, establishing a dedicated green balance-sheet window for Nigerian energy and food systems.

Tranche Breakdown & Sectoral Mandates

The $30 million senior facility will be deployed across two core verticals aligned with Sterling Bank's specialized "HEART" investment strategy (Health, Education, Agriculture, Renewable Energy, and Transportation):

• Renewable Energy Tranche (80% / $24.0 Million): Direct financial intermediation targeting off-grid solar equipment, rooftop commercial & industrial (C&I) solar installations, and decentralized energy access. The deployment supports the broader Mission 300 program co-led by the World Bank Group and African Development Bank to connect 300 million Africans to electricity by 2030.
• Agricultural Value Chain Tranche (20% / $6.0 Million): Working capital and expansion credit for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) operating across domestic food processing, storage, logistics, and input distribution.

Institutional Transition & Sustainability Framework

The credit line builds on Sterling Bank’s target of achieving full operational carbon neutrality by 2050. The bank has solarized its corporate headquarters alongside nearly half of its retail branch and ATM network.

The capital deployment will interface directly with Sterling Bank’s digital clean-tech platforms, including:

• Imperium: A digital marketplace matching residential and commercial clients with renewable energy equipment vendors and long-term financing.
• Qoray Mobility: An electric mobility ecosystem financing EV fleet adoption and technical training, with targeted inclusion frameworks for female operators.
• OneWoman Initiative: Gender-lens investing guidelines structured to allocate credit access to female-led agritech and commercial enterprises.

Executive Statements

"We have long treated Nigeria’s power problem as a generation problem waiting for the grid to solve it. Increasingly, it is a financing problem with a distributed solution," stated Abubakar Suleiman, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Sterling Bank. "Millions of households and businesses already pay for power through generators. What they lack is the capital to switch to something cleaner and, over time, cheaper. That is the gap this facility helps us close. Agriculture has the same problem: demand is rarely what holds farmers back; the cost and availability of credit along the value chain is. Sterling's HEART strategy rests on a simple view: a bank does its best work where finance changes outcomes. Our partnership with Proparco extends that work."

"In Nigeria, as throughout Africa, the energy transition must be a driver for sustainable transformation, at the intersection of climate, economic, and social challenges," added Christophe Lecourtier, Chief Executive Officer of the French Development Agency (AFD). "Through this first partnership with Sterling Bank, the AFD Group, through its subsidiary Proparco, is helping to align our partners’ development needs with the strategic interests shared by Africa, France and Europe. This financing will increase access to clean and reliable energy, support SMEs and local agricultural value chains, and foster job-creating growth. This partnership will also promote joint projects between Nigerian and French companies."

Nigeria: First partnership between Proparco (AFD Group) and Sterling Bank to finance renewable energy and agriculture

Agence française de développement (AFD) Group, through its private sector subsidiary Proparco, and Sterling Bank announce the signing of a USD 30 million senior credit facility. The financing will accelerate the development of renewable energy and support small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) across Nigeria’s agricultural value chain. By mobilizing a local bank to support the climate transition and economic development, the operation will contribute to Nigeria’s development priorities and create new opportunities for cooperation. This agreement marks the first step towards a long-term partnership between the two institutions.

PROPARCO - Groupe Agence Française de Développement

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