Africa’s vaccine ambitions depend on more than mRNA factories. Sustainable production requires stronger regulators, supply chains, and financing.

In May, South African regulators officially authorized Afrigen Biologics in Cape Town to manufacture biological products for early clinical trials, making it the first facility in Africa to receive such approval. A few weeks later, I arrived there as an intern.

Growing up in Cairo, I assumed vaccine manufacturing was largely a matter of having the necessary resources. Five weeks at the World Health Organization’s (WHO) mRNA technology transfer hub taught me otherwise. Vaccine independence, I learned, depends on something far more complicated: an entire ecosystem. On the flight home, I found myself wondering whether Egypt was building one.

Across Africa, brilliant scientists and physicians have the talent to do this work. Yet without manufacturing capacity, functioning supply chains, and the financing to support that talent, their potential remains frustratingly out of reach. When COVID-19 struck, the consequences of those gaps became impossible to ignore.

The first COVID-19 vaccines were authorized for emergency use primarily in wealthy countries, which had already secured much of the initial supply. Many African and other low-income countries were left waiting for whatever doses remained. Export restrictions and manufacturers’ commitments to bilateral agreements further constrained availability. Poorer countries had to depend on COVAX and donations from wealthier governments, often receiving imported doses long after they were urgently needed. While parts of the world reopened, people across Africa were still waiting for their first shot, living in fear, struggling to breathe on ventilators, or watching loved ones die.

That inequity helped spur the WHO and the Medicines Patent Pool to launch an mRNA technology transfer program at Afrigen in 2021. Working with the local vaccine manufacturer Biovac and the South African Medical Research Council, the initiative set out to transfer more than a formula. It sought to share the practices, processes, quality systems, and manufacturing expertise needed to produce mRNA-based health products independently. According to the WHO, Afrigen developed its own COVID-19 vaccine technology and completed its first technology transfer to Biovac in September 2024. The significance of that model is profound: expertise that once had to be imported can now be acquired, tested, refined, and passed on by African scientists.

Before arriving at Afrigen, I imagined a factory pursuing vaccine independence as a finished machine: build it, turn it on, and begin producing doses. Working inside the system dismantled that assumption. I began as an observer, learning from patient and knowledgeable staff. Again and again, I heard about the importance of dependable suppliers, rigorous quality controls, capable and confident regulators, and manufacturers that could remain operational long after a public health emergency had passed.

The payoff extends beyond any single vaccine. Once scientists and manufacturers possess the knowledge and systems required to produce one mRNA product, they have the foundation for a platform that can respond to future diseases. Trained workers, validated procedures, analytical testing, and reliable quality controls can make adaptation faster than constructing a production system from scratch. That advantage matters because outbreaks can spread far faster than supply chains can adjust or governments can negotiate access. Still, mRNA technology does not eliminate the need for clinical trials or regulatory scrutiny, and scaling production takes time. Its promise lies in shortening some stages of development, which is precisely why investment cannot be reserved for moments of crisis.

mRNA manufacturing also requires sterile production conditions and cold storage, often at temperatures below freezing. Those demands are costly. Yet even when an individual product fails, the technical skills, institutional knowledge, and disciplined manufacturing practices developed along the way can endure.

Africa’s ambitions are substantial. Through the Partnerships for African Vaccine Manufacturing, the African Union aims to have 60 percent of the continent’s vaccines manufactured locally by 2040. Gavi’s African Vaccine Manufacturing Accelerator is designed to make up to $1.2 billion available over ten years, beginning in 2024, to support commercially viable vaccine production. Gavi planned to make its first payments from the fund to an African manufacturer in the second half of 2026.

Yet for all that ambition, Africa still produces less than 1 percent of the vaccines it consumes. Building a factory does not guarantee that vaccines will be manufactured, approved, purchased, distributed, or trusted. Nor is a factory inexpensive to maintain when production falls below capacity. Facilities that remain idle between outbreaks risk losing skilled employees and allowing quality systems to deteriorate. The result can be little more than a pandemic showroom: impressive when visitors arrive, but largely empty the rest of the year. Kenya offers a cautionary example. In 2024, Moderna paused plans to construct an mRNA facility there as demand for COVID-19 vaccines declined. Manufacturers need predictable markets, supported by pooled procurement and long-term purchasing agreements, not merely the promise of orders during the next emergency.

Regulation is another essential part of that ecosystem, and it cannot be improvised during a crisis. Move too slowly, and lifesaving products remain out of reach. Move too carelessly, and one serious failure can undermine public confidence in an entire system. A June 2026 survey of 27 African vaccine manufacturers found that only one had submitted an application to its national regulator for a vaccine intended for the broader African market. Regional regulatory cooperation is a welcome step, but national authorities also need the resources, technical capacity, and independence to oversee a growing industry effectively.

Even vaccines manufactured in Africa may depend on imported lipids, enzymes, filters, vials, and specialized machinery. Local production can reduce exposure to global supply disruptions, but vaccine sovereignty remains incomplete without diversified suppliers and domestic or regional sources of critical materials. The same is true of clinical-trial networks, dependable electricity and water, cold-chain infrastructure, and institutions capable of purchasing vaccines at scale.

The benefits must also extend beyond a handful of countries. If new facilities cater only to markets able to pay the highest prices, the inequities exposed in 2021 will simply acquire a new address. Vaccine equity is therefore a matter of governance as much as technology. It depends on which manufacturers receive funding, which diseases attract research, how purchases are negotiated, and whether lower-income countries have a meaningful place in distribution plans.

The WHO hub offers a promising starting point precisely because it is built around sharing knowledge and developing local expertise. But the longer-term goal must be institutions that are led by Africans, owned locally, and capable of setting their own priorities.

Egypt has several advantages that many African countries do not. By early 2022, its vaccine manufacturer VACSERA had produced more than 30 million doses of a COVID-19 vaccine. In 2024, Egypt became the first African country whose regulator reached WHO maturity level 3 for both medicines and vaccines. Scientists from the Egyptian company Biogeneric Pharma received their first mRNA training at Afrigen in 2022, a relationship that has since developed into a formal technology transfer agreement. EVA Pharma, working with European partners, has operated its own mRNA hub since January 2025, with plans to produce as many as 100 million vials annually.

That makes Egypt a country worth watching. Its regulator meets an important WHO benchmark, and its manufacturers have already demonstrated the ability to produce vaccines at scale. The government hopes to export vaccines to more than 60 countries by 2030. But the question I kept hearing in Cape Town remains unanswered: Who will buy those vaccines between outbreaks?

Africa’s investment in mRNA manufacturing is a risk worth taking. COVID-19 showed how dangerous international cooperation can become when one side controls the factories, the raw materials, and, ultimately, the bargaining power. When the next pandemic arrives, the countries best positioned to respond will not simply be those that once built facilities. They will be those that kept their factories operating, their regulators trusted, their workers trained, their suppliers dependable, and their purchasing systems functioning through the years between emergencies.

Africa’s mRNA bet will be judged not by ribbon-cuttings, but by what survives after the cameras leave and before the next crisis begins. What matters is the system behind every vial.