From Curitiba to Santo Domingo: how France is investing in the future of Latin America and the Caribbean

In Curitiba, 1,693 families were living in an area exposed to flooding from the Barigui River, without reliable access to water or sanitation services. Since 2020, France, through AFD Group, has co-financed an integrated urban development program combining resettlement, drainage infrastructure, green spaces, and social inclusion measures. To date, 560 housing units have been delivered outside high-risk areas. The result: zero floods recorded in the area in 2025, compared with an average of 1.75 flood events per year between 2010 and 2018.

Empresas Públicas de Medellín (EPM) is Colombia’s leading public utility operator, providing essential services including energy, water, sanitation, and waste management. AFD Group has supported the company for more than a decade: several successive financing operations since 2012, totaling nearly €455 million, reflect a long-term partnership built on trust.

These investments have supported concrete, transformative projects: the modernization of Medellín’s public lighting system, the commissioning in 2024 of the Tepuy solar photovoltaic park, the expansion of rural electricity networks, an energy loss reduction program, and infrastructure helping clean up the Medellín River and its tributaries.

At the beginning of the 20th century, forests covered 85% of the Dominican Central Mountain Range. Decades of intensive exploitation that followed led to soil erosion and weakened water resources. Since 2001, AFD has supported the Plan Sierra association through a reforestation, water resource management, and rural development program implemented in three successive phases.

The results include a nursery capable of producing more than four million seedlings a year, nine villages connected to drinking water services (benefiting nearly 1,000 families) and 700 households gaining access to financing for their economic activities. In total, nearly €32 million in loans and €2.5 million in grants have been mobilized to generate long-term impact by sustainably strengthening ecosystems and the livelihoods of local communities and future generations.

Cochabamba is Bolivia’s third-largest city, home to 1.5 million people, and its population could double by 2040 as a result of rural migration. In this dry-climate region, water resources are dwindling and shortages are chronic.

To address this challenge, France, through AFD, is financing the construction of infrastructure that will transport water from the Misicuni dam to households through a €44 million loan. The goal is to improve access to safe drinking water for around 450,000 residents in the municipalities of Tiquipaya, Cochabamba, and Sacaba by 2036, while strengthening the capacities of local operators to ensure sustainable management of the service.

In Mexico, Proparco is helping improve education for 1.5 million students by supporting Grupo EDILAR, a family-owned company that provides educational tools and teacher training, primarily for the public sector.

Following an initial financing agreement signed in 2014, Proparco renewed its long-term partnership with Grupo EDILAR in 2024 through a second local-currency loan equivalent to €11 million.

By targeting public-sector teachers, this new financing will help improve the quality of education for 1.5 million students, particularly among the most disadvantaged populations in both urban and rural areas. The project has also received the “2X Challenge” label, with women accounting for 68% of EDILAR’s clients.