Source: French to English Tester Published on: 2026-04-22
Source: The Conversation – France (in French)– By Yanis Rihi, PhD student in political economy of development, Paris-Saclay University
This is a 2.5 billion euro project that claims to be about climate justice. The Just Energy Transition Partnerships, or JETP, is supposed to help Senegal decarbonize, with European and Canadian funding. But when looking at the nature of the funds and the geopolitical context, one question remains unanswered: doesn’t this mechanism maintain current inequalities?
This is a project that, on paper, would be enough to please all those concerned with an energy transition in Africa and with global climate justice. Signed in 2023 between theSenegal, on the one hand, and, on the other, several developed countries, the Just Energy Transition Partnership (JETP) ensures, as its name indicates, to work towards this.French President Emmanuel Macron stated this during his launch, that this partnership should allow Senegal to “continue to develop economically and provide access to energy for the entire population, while placing the country on a low-carbon trajectory.”
Yet, behind these declarations, deep tensions emerge that prompt questioning the very notion of justice in light of an international community structured by historically unequal North-South relations and, above all, ofincreasingly fragmented.
The Senegalese JETP: a response to the demands of international climate justice?
To understand why, let’s start by seeing exactly what this project consists of. Although it began as a political promise from Senegal to reduce its dependence on fossil fuels, it then materialized as a financial commitment with an initial duration of three to five years, of approximately 2.9 billion dollars (2.5 billion euros), from the Group of International Partners (GPI), composed notably of France, Germany, the European Union, the United Kingdom, Canada, multilateral development banks, and private actors. This sum of money is intended to support Senegal’s energy transition towards decarbonized energy sources.
In theoretical terms, the JETP is part of an explicit acknowledgment of the historical responsibility of industrialized countries in the accumulation of greenhouse gas emissions.The text emphasizesas well as that Senegal is “highly exposed to the effects of climate change, while contributing marginally to global greenhouse gas emissions,” while recalling “the commitment of developed countries to provide financial support for the mitigation and adaptation efforts of developing countries.” Thus reiterating the formulation relating to “common but differentiated responsibilities” that structures international climate negotiations.
The partnership thus presents itself as an attempt to correct certain global climate injustices, notably by supporting the decarbonization efforts of a low-emission country in a context of high exposure to the impacts of climate change.
Thus, and strengthened by itssignificant solar and wind potential, Senegal commits, by signing this agreement with the support of its Northern partners, to:
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Develop a macroeconomic modeling of pathways towards a low-carbon and resilient economy;
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Raising the share of renewable energies to 40% of the electricity mix by 2030 (currently 31% according to the installed production capacity)Â ;
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Gradually reduce the use of highly polluting fossil fuels in electricity production.
A priori, these objectives appear coherent and legitimate to allow a rapid phase-out of fossil fuels. However, when zooming out, this project takes place while others are also underway, with goals that are at odds, such as theSangomar hydrocarbon exploitation project, Senegal’s first offshore oil field, located about a hundred kilometers south of Dakar, and which began production in 2024.
Developed as part of a partnership between the Australian company Woodside Energy,majority operator, and the Senegalese national company Petrosen, Sangomar illustrates the simultaneous involvement of Western actors in the expansion of the country’s oil exploitation. The development of the first phase of the offshore oil fieldrepresenting approximately 5 billion dollars of investment, an amount much higher than the total funding mobilized under the JETP.
Some companies from JETP partner countries are also involved in the development of hydrocarbons in Senegal. This is notably the case of the British company BP, engaged in theGreater Tortue Ahmeyim offshore gas project, as well as the French company TotalEnergies,active on several exploration blocks off the coast of the country.
In the face of this paradox, an argument is often invoked: that of the right to development, according to which it would be unfair to require countries of the South to give up exploiting fossil resources likely to support their development, while countries of the North have historically enriched themselves thanks to these same resources and remain the main contributors to climate change.
Also to read:
How to fight against climate change without deepening inequalities between the North and the South?
But this ambivalence is only one aspect of the questions regarding the real fairness of Western countries’ commitment to Senegal’s energy transition.
Behind the political commitment: a reproduction of financial asymmetries?
Another concern is the nature of the promised funds, as well as their disbursements. Because nearly three years after the signing of the agreement, it is first noted that the promised financing has been slow to materialize. Indeed, to date, no disbursement has been made and negotiations remain stalled, particularly regarding the nature of the financial instruments mobilized.
The majority of the funds envisaged would currently take the form of concessional loans, for an amountestimated at around 1.8 billion euros(of the 2.5 billion promised). However, this financial arrangement poses a major problem in a country whose public debt has reached historically high levels, nearly118.8% of GDP, according to the International Monetary Fund, at the end of the year 2024.
In this sense, it is legitimate to wonder whether an energy transition financed by debt from Western lenders can truly be considered just. Moreover, when one knows how much the dependence of Southern creditors on their debtor developed countries is a lever of power.
More clearly, these shifting lines, between promise and conditionality, require knowing whether climate justice is not rather at risk of transforming into a new form of financial discipline, perpetuating relations of subordination inherited from the colonial and postcolonial history of the so-called “beneficiary” countries of these JETPs. For example, similar to the structural adjustment plans imposed in the 1980s-1990s, whichconditioned access to international funding on deep economic reforms, often to the detriment of the room for maneuver of States and social policies.
Overall, these questions highlight areas of uncertainty that deserve to be better clarified. They notably call for a better understanding of the actors involved in negotiations with the donors, as well as the power dynamics that structure and condition them. Such clarification, fueled by research and public debate, would more so constitute a prerequisite for the assessment of the directions and effects of the JETP on Senegal’s energy and social priorities.
JETP as a geopolitical instrument: international support or leverage of influence?
However, financial aspects alone are not sufficient to grasp all the concerns currently surrounding the Senegalese JETP, as it is also part of a geopolitical context undergoing profound reconfiguration. For several years, Europe, and notably France, has been experiencing asignificant decline of its influence in Francophone Africa, marked by diplomatic breakups and coups d’état in the Sahel. At the same time,The influence of China and Russia is becoming apparent in several African countries, offering alternatives to traditional Western partnerships.
In such a context, the JETP can then be read as a tool for reconsolidating influence, aiming to maintain the anchoring of Western donors in a strategically stable country like Senegal. Moreover, it can constitute an opportunity for private actors from the North to establish themselves sustainably in the renewable energy sector, a market that is, in addition, experiencing strong growth across the African continent.
The emerging experiences of related JETPs carried out simultaneously in Indonesia, Vietnam, and South Africa confirm this.Recent researchspecifically warn against the way these partnerships could favor the entry of foreign multinationals into local energy markets or steer projects towards the logic of exporting electricity or green hydrogen to benefit the energy mixes of the Norths, thereby makinghost countries a real ground for geopolitical competition.
Certainly more recent, and therefore still difficult to evaluate, the case of the Senegalese JETP nevertheless highlights a fundamental contradiction in contemporary sustainable development. That of a fracture between the normative promises of climate justice and the political, economic, and historical realities of its implementation. Of theblur surrounding certain aspects of the agreement to the lack of accessible public documentation, including the absence of a broad democratic debate, numerous deadlocks cast doubt on the real purpose of this mechanism in terms of social and climate justice.
At this stage, several essential elements remain poorly documented, such as the precise allocation of funding between grants, concessional loans, and private investments, the detailed list of projects to be financed, as well as the conditions and objectives associated with these funds. Yet, for an international partnership mobilizing several billion euros and intended to sustainably transform the country’s energy system, such a lack of visibility raises legitimate questions regarding its governance and democratic ownership.
These difficulties are not, moreover, unique to the Senegalese case.Several recent analysesdedicated to the JETPs implemented elsewhere highlight recurring pitfalls, such as the slowness of the effective mobilization of promised funds, the gap between the amounts announced and the resources actually mobilized, as well as uncertainties regarding the adequacy between the projects financed and the energy and social needs of partner countries. These tensions reveal thestructural challenges posed by this new type of climate financial partnership.
Margins for maneuver still possible
Only the recentInvestment Plan (2025)published by the Senegalese Ministry of Energy, Petroleum, and Mines, allows outlining the initial contours of the decarbonization projects expected to result from the JETP. These notably include so-called projects “Quick Win“”, among which is, for example, an electrification program for the Saloum islands by thedeployment of decentralized photovoltaic installations, quickly operationalizable.
Far from rejecting the principle and importance of these international partnerships for accelerating the global energy transition, the main point is to consider them with some perspective. Still too often reduced to a slogan and a tool of foreign policy, the operationalization of climate justice in countries of the Global South should rather constitute a vector for profound transformation of “capabilities” for development and resilience, in the sense of the approach developed by economist and philosopher Amartya Sen. He conceived development as the enlargement of real freedoms and effective possibilities for individual action, thus allowing Senegalese society to choose and steer its own transition trajectory.
That is why, in this context, it seems important to directly address the historical inequalities still at work in international relations, which currently appear to structure and condition the supposedly just objectives of these JETP. Vigilance therefore remains necessary while awaiting the unveiling and implementation of the complementary decarbonization projects that will result from this partnership, which, ultimately, will make it possible to determine whether this global climate justice initiative can truly become a lever in the service of society and Senegal’s energy transition.
Yanis Rihi does not work for, advise, own shares in, or receive funds from any organization that could benefit from this article, and has declared no other affiliation than his research institution.
–ref. How climate justice risks becoming an instrument of domination: the case of the Just Energy Transition Partnerships (JETP) in Senegal –https://theconversation.com/how-climate-justice-risks-becoming-a-tool-of-domination-the-case-of-just-energy-transition-partnerships-jetp-in-senegal-278032