In the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), work is underway on the Lobito rail corridor.

“Initial works have begun,” said Julien Paluku, the Congolese minister of foreign trade, on 10 February.

While the sections located in Angola are already completed, “the corridor is only viable if the Congolese section is developed”, the official said.

Lobito Atlantic Railway

In this regard, the World Bank has committed to releasing $500m, while the European Investment Bank has expressed willingness to contribute via the Global Gateway initiative.

Among the financiers is the US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC), which has already formalised a $553m loan to the Lobito Atlantic Railway consortium and stated it is ready to mobilise up to $1bn for the Congolese section.

No project better illustrates the new American economic diplomacy – driven by the DFC – than the Lobito corridor.

In December 2025, the agency granted an initial loan for the rehabilitation of the railway line connecting the mining regions of the DRC to the Angolan port of Lobito.

It is a strategic axis for the export of copper and cobalt, minerals essential for digital technologies and the energy transition.

While Washington presents this project as a model of “sustainable and transparent” financing, avoiding debt traps, Beijing may view it as a direct challenge to its historic influence in the region, particularly regarding its investments in the Tanzania-Zambia (Tazara) corridor.

For Sidy Diop, a partner in the Economic Advisory department at Deloitte, this example illustrates a new generation of projects “that go beyond simple funding to integrate issues of securing supplies and value chains”.

“It is no longer a question of aid for aid’s sake, but of investing to secure power interests,” says Julio Nganongo Osséré, a development policy specialist.

When development meets strategic interests

Officially launched in January 2020, the DFC is the heir to the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (Opic) and parts of USAID’s instruments.

Born from the Build Act during Donald Trump’s first term, it was designed to address a dual diagnosis by the US administration: traditional development aid mechanisms were judged as ineffective as they were insufficiently aligned with national interests, while China was achieving a meteoric rise in infrastructure financing in emerging nations.

Like other development aid institutions, the DFC mobilises classic instruments: loans, guarantees and – a major novelty compared with Opic – equity investments.

These tools do not in themselves constitute a break with existing practices: financing development via the private sector has existed for a long time, both in the US and Europe, through institutions such as Proparco (French Development Agency) or the IFC (World Bank).

“The idea that the private sector is an essential engine of growth is a fundamental trend, supported for decades by numerous development institutions,” says Bruno Cabrillac, director general of the Foundation for Studies and Research on International Development (FERDI).

It is no longer a question of aid for aid’s sake, but of investing to secure power interests

The organisation’s singularity lies in its prioritisation of American interests.

Where most development banks remain discreet about the defence of national interests, the DFC fully assumes its role as a foreign policy tool.

“We make America stronger, safer, and more prosperous,” boasts the agency, claiming a direct articulation between economic development and national security.

This assertion of US interests sits squarely within a logic of strategic rivalry with Beijing.

“We are no longer in a soft power logic, but in a form of hard power akin to a cold economic war with China,” adds Cabrillac.

The primacy of return on investment

“What fundamentally distinguishes the DFC is the explicit introduction of a return on investment criterion for the American taxpayer, which becomes central to project selection,” says Cabrillac.

“At counterparts like Proparco or the IFC, the primary aim is to resolve a market failure. At the DFC, one must also ensure the operation benefits American companies directly, creates no distortion to their detriment, and does not compete with them.”

This logic marks an open shift towards a transactional approach to development, in which local impact (jobs, infrastructure, growth) is evaluated but remains subordinate to broader economic and strategic considerations.

Long limited to $60bn in potential commitments, the DFC changed dimension with its reauthorisation in late 2025 under the National Defence Authorisation Act.

Its investment cap was raised to more than $200bn per year, and its mandate expanded.

Middle-income countries have governance tools that allow these investments to be better directed

The institution can now intervene in middle-income or even high-income countries, though the allocation for these nations cannot exceed 10% of its budget.

“The fact that the DFC is authorised to finance developed countries clearly shows we are no longer in a developmentalist paradigm,” says Patrick Plane, an affiliate professor at Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P) and research director at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS).

Africa: A privileged testing ground

Sub-Saharan Africa occupies a significant place in this strategy. Officially, the DFC supports access to energy, digital technology, infrastructure and industrialisation there.

In reality, its portfolio reveals that “it is primarily middle-income countries that are best served in terms of financing,” adds Plane, who cites “a broader and deeper private sector” as the foundation for this.

For Plane, “the over-indebtedness of around 50 countries and political instability dissuade the DFC from engaging other than on very targeted operations”.

Désiré Avom, a specialist in development issues, sees this as a debatable but coherent choice: “Middle-income countries have governance tools that allow these investments to be better directed.”

In practice, its projects display great heterogeneity. Some investments clearly fall under sectoral development, notably the financing of a thermal power plant in Sierra Leone to increase the country’s electrical capacity by 75% – a type of initiative now excluded from the portfolios of other development structures that no longer finance coal and hydrocarbons.

However, it also includes support for agricultural credit platforms in Kenya and backing for port infrastructure in Gabon to support post-oil diversification.

Others, however, are presented unambiguously as instruments of geopolitical competition.

Poor countries without mineral resources risk being even more marginalised and vulnerable

In the digital sector, the DFC has taken a strategic stake in Cassava Technologies, a pan-African player in data centres and fibre optics, alongside Google.

The aim is openly to promote an alternative infrastructure to Chinese solutions that is “secure and transparent”, while facilitating the expansion of American tech giants on the continent.

“It is a war machine against China, but Africa can find value in it because these sectors are still underdeveloped on the continent and are drivers of growth,” says Cabrillac.

The same logic applies in Senegal, where a DFC loan supports a US digital logistics company, allowing African consumers to buy from Western platforms – a project presented as both a driver of local growth and an opportunity for American businesses.

An opportunity… under strict conditions

For Sidy Diop, the rise of the DFC nevertheless constitutes a real opportunity for certain African economies.

“In a context of contracting funding and the relative withdrawal of several traditional donors, the arrival of a player with increased means is rather good news,” he says.

According to Diop, this new approach, heavily oriented towards financing profitable private projects, can favour the development of structural infrastructure, particularly in energy, telecoms or logistics, while generating jobs and local economic spinoffs.

He specifies that this type of project, like the Lobito corridor, illustrates a new generation of DFC initiatives intended to remain at the heart of its portfolio in Africa.

However, this dynamic has a downside and “risks creating orphans of international aid,” says Cabrillac.

“Poor countries without mineral resources risk being even more marginalised and vulnerable.”

In the long term, the DFC embodies an open shift towards an investment diplomacy based on mutual interest and profitability.

“We are no longer in the developmentalist paradigm that structured the action of USAID or the World Bank,” says Patrick Plane.

“With the DFC, African states are learning to negotiate in a quasi-zero-sum game,” says Julio Nganongo Osséré.

“This business orientation empowers, but it also opens up vulnerabilities, particularly in social sectors historically supported by American aid.”