Wired for change? Road transport electrification across the Global South

Trans­port is a sec­tor that emits par­tic­u­larly high levels of green­house gases (GHGs): road trans­port alone accounts for 12% of glob­al emis­sions¹. CO₂ emis­sions from developed eco­nom­ies (mostly loc­ated in the North­ern Hemi­sphere) have been plat­eau­ing for the past dec­ade. In con­trast, those from emer­ging eco­nom­ies, although lower, are con­stantly rising.

Yao Tsoekeo Amedokpo. Our work focuses on Africa and Asia. In Africa, vehicle elec­tri­fic­a­tion is indeed a rel­at­ively recent phe­nomen­on: the first sig­ni­fic­ant ini­ti­at­ives date back to 2008, before see­ing rap­id growth a dec­ade later, in 2019. The Cov­id-19 crisis slowed the momentum, before a new surge. Elec­tri­fic­a­tion affects all types of vehicles, from bicycles to buses, but two-wheel­ers and three-wheel­ers are by far the most affected [editor’s note: for example, 46% of three-wheel­ers sold in Asia in 2022 were elec­tric⁴.

As for usage, there is a clear pre­dom­in­ance of elec­tric vehicles in com­mer­cial trans­port, unlike in North­ern coun­tries. Elec­tric cars account for less than 1% of car sales in Africa. Con­versely, in China, the adop­tion rate of elec­tric cars is very high, with nearly 50% of sales in 2024.

Man­on Eskenazi. In Asia and Africa, two- and three-wheeled vehicles are the most widely used motor­ised vehicles. It there­fore makes sense that elec­tri­fic­a­tion should focus primar­ily on these. The oth­er major dif­fer­ence con­cerns char­ging man­age­ment. In France, for example, the roll-out of char­ging infra­struc­ture has been a major obstacle to the devel­op­ment of elec­tric cars. In South-East Asia and Africa, the mod­el is based on “bat­tery-as-a-ser­vice”: the user owns the vehicle, but not the bat­tery. All they need to do is vis­it a sta­tion to swap the bat­tery, which is much quick­er than wait­ing for a full charge.

YA. By mak­ing bat­ter­ies avail­able on a sub­scrip­tion basis, oper­at­ors have man­aged to reduce costs: the price of an elec­tric motor­bike is now com­par­able to that of its com­bus­tion-engine equi­val­ent. This busi­ness mod­el has encour­aged the roll-out of elec­tric two-wheelers.

ME. Elec­tri­fic­a­tion is being driv­en by two dif­fer­ent trends. On the one hand, ride-hail­ing plat­forms (such as Grab) have become a real driv­ing force behind the elec­tri­fic­a­tion of two-wheel­ers by favour­ing drivers using elec­tric vehicles. On the oth­er hand, when it comes to pub­lic trans­port, pro­jects are fun­ded by inter­na­tion­al donors (such as the World Bank). Their decision-mak­ing power is there­fore sig­ni­fic­ant: they are increas­ingly mak­ing their fund­ing con­di­tion­al on the elec­tri­fic­a­tion of fleets. As a res­ult, sev­er­al elec­tric pub­lic trans­port ser­vices have been developed in recent years: the Bus Rap­id Trans­it sys­tem in Dakar, the Liên Ninh elec­tric buses in Hanoi, and the upcom­ing Bus Rap­id Trans­it sys­tem in Abidjan.

YA. We have begun map­ping pub­lic policies across the Afric­an con­tin­ent. Sev­er­al Afric­an gov­ern­ments are start­ing to incor­por­ate meas­ures to sup­port the trans­ition to elec­tric mobil­ity: put­ting it on the agenda with roadmaps; nation­al elec­tro­mobil­ity strategies; or even isol­ated meas­ures, for example, in fin­ance laws.

Ana­lys­is of these meas­ures reveals a scattered and incom­plete set of meas­ures, primar­ily focused on tax incent­ives: exemp­tions from import duties, VAT or excise duties aimed at redu­cing the cost of elec­tric vehicles. These meas­ures appear to point to two dis­tinct policy tra­ject­or­ies. On the one hand, fleet policies are char­ac­ter­ised by sup­port for imports and the gradu­al elec­tri­fic­a­tion of vehicle fleets (Togo, Ben­in). On the oth­er hand, indus­tri­al policies aim to loc­al­ise part of the added value of the trans­ition (South Africa, Niger­ia, Kenya).

ME. In South-East Asia, there is also a drive to strengthen inde­pend­ence by mov­ing away from fossil fuels. These coun­tries are par­tic­u­larly affected by cur­rent con­flicts, and elec­tri­fic­a­tion rep­res­ents a major geo­pol­it­ic­al issue for them. Some states, such as the Phil­ip­pines and Indone­sia, are already imple­ment­ing sov­er­eignty meas­ures relat­ing to mobility.

YA. This is also the case in Africa, where some coun­tries are adopt­ing an increas­ingly sys­tem­ic approach. In cer­tain coun­tries that gen­er­ate hydro­elec­tri­city or are heav­ily depend­ent on oil imports, policies are being imple­men­ted to devel­op renew­able energy and elec­tric mobil­ity: Niger­ia, Ghana, Rwanda, etc.

YA. Yes, and for sev­er­al reas­ons. We have already men­tioned the import­ance of energy sov­er­eignty for these coun­tries. But we can add to that a cru­cial health issue. Afric­an cit­ies face sig­ni­fic­ant levels of air pol­lu­tion due to age­ing fleets of com­bus­tion-engine vehicles. Elec­tri­fic­a­tion is there­fore a key lever for improv­ing pub­lic health.

Finally, the cli­mate bene­fits are real. The elec­tri­fic­a­tion of trans­port forces coun­tries to pro­duce more elec­tri­city, push­ing them towards policies to devel­op renew­able energy. Added to this is the grow­ing car­bon foot­print of trans­port in the Glob­al South, driv­en by the recent emer­gence of the middle class. This is a pivotal moment, and it is import­ant to act now.

YA. Yes, abso­lutely. With the glob­al rise of elec­tri­fic­a­tion, Afric­an coun­tries are look­ing to cap­it­al­ise on the added value of the trans­ition. This involves reor­gan­ising the vehicle value chain, from man­u­fac­tur­ing right through to main­ten­ance. Finally, on a small scale, elec­tri­fic­a­tion can halve oper­at­ing costs for motor­bike taxi drivers. This is a real oppor­tun­ity for citizens.

Editor’s note: A recent World Bank report ana­lyses the eco­nom­ic bene­fits of elec­tri­fy­ing trans­port in devel­op­ing coun­tries. Through tar­geted invest­ments, improved fin­an­cing mod­els and strategies to relo­cate indus­tries, the report notes that elec­tric trans­port can cre­ate jobs, strengthen the eco­nomy and sup­port sus­tain­able, inclus­ive growth⁵.

ME. Some loc­al stake­hold­ers have also seized upon the elec­tri­fic­a­tion of pub­lic trans­port to increase the num­ber of women in the sec­tor through train­ing in elec­tric vehicles. In Kenya, for example, whilst pub­lic trans­port is per­ceived as a very male-dom­in­ated pro­fes­sion, the elec­tri­fic­a­tion of minibuses is viewed neg­at­ively by drivers. This has enabled women to access these jobs.

Interview by Anaïs Maréchal