Biovac Wins EU, IFC Money to Build Biggest Africa Vaccine Plant

South Africa’s Biovac Institute won funding from the European Investment Bank and the International Finance Corp. to expand its vaccine facility in Cape Town that will be the continent’s biggest once completed.

The partly state-owned company will receive €75 million ($88 million) from the EIB in the form of a “quasi-equity” investment and a $20 million loan led by the IFC to build the plant, the firm and the funders said in a joint statement on Thursday. The plant will cost a total of $180 million, Biovac Chief Executive Officer Morena Makhoana said by text message.