Africa trade insurer seeks $500m to help with Iran war cost increase

Africa’s leading multilateral insurer of trade risk is seeking around $500 million in capital from ‌partners to support countries that face higher costs as a result of conflict in the Middle East, its chief executive told Reuters.

African Trade & Investment Development Insurance was seeking to increase its existing capital base of close to $1 billion even before U.S.-Israeli airstrikes on Iran at the end of February unleashed a war that is likely to increase inflation across the globe.

Its CEO Manuel Moses told Reuters the Middle Eastern crisis had made the problem urgent.

“Demand is coming faster than we can absorb with our current balance sheet,” Moses said in an interview. “Given what is happening now, we probably need to take that to about $1.5 billion.”

In addition, Moses said he was keen to set up a separate financing facility of around $1 billion to help it respond more quickly to similar situations in the future.

He said higher prices for energy and other commodities caused by disruption to trade flows meant member countries were seeking to increase their trade finance limits by an average ‌of 20% to help cover more expensive imports.

Demand for the guarantees and insurance ATIDI provides had already increased as richer countries, led by the United States under U.S. President Donald Trump, have scaled back development aid.

Moses did not name potential donors, but said he was holding discussions with them as countries gather in Washington this week for the World Bank’s Spring Meetings. Existing backers include Britain, India, Italy and Japan.

He said any recapitalisation of ATIDI should be part of a broader system response to the impact of the Middle Eastern crisis.

“The institutions are already asking what the response should be, and we want to be part of that solution,” Moses said.

“This is not something we can respond to in isolation – it has to be a system‑level response.”

Underlining the broader economic value of supporting the insurer, he said each dollar in capital is leveraged around 10 times and has supported $93 billion in trade and investment since the insurer was founded in 2001 and $10 billion a year over the last five years.