‘World Bank needs new playbook to boost private investment in emerging markets’

WASHINGTON: The World Bank must use “informed risk-taking” to encourage private investors to get more engaged in helping developing countries deal with climate change and leapfrog fossil-fuel energy sources, its new president, Ajay Banga, said on Sunday.

Banga told CNN‘s “Fareed Zakaria GPS” program that efforts now under way to stretch the World Bank’s lending capacity and revamp its business model could potentially free up “tens of billions” of dollars, not the estimated trillions of dollars needed to ensure a just energy transition.

World Bank board elects US nominee Ajay Banga as president

Private sector capital was critical since funds from governments, philanthropies, the World Bank and other multilateral development banks (MDBs) would never suffice to help poor countries adapt to and mitigate climate change, said Banga, a former Mastercard CEO who took office on June 2.

“The only way forward is to find a way to get the private sector to believe that this is part of their future,” said Banga, who will visit Peru and Jamaica this week as part of a tour to visit countries in every region where the bank operates. “What I think we have to do is … to find ways in the MDB system to think of a different playbook - to take on the risks that they cannot take on,” he said, noting that private companies were bound to deliver returns for shareholders and could not take on the risks involved, but the bank could help.