Transport Financing Needs and Trends

The poor and inadequate state of much of Africa’s transport network is holding many countries back from competing effectively on the global market. Effective transport networks are a key component of the investment climate, enabling people and goods access to markets and reducing the costs of doing business.  Intra-African trade stands at less than 10 % of all African GDP and Africa’s share of world trade is only 2%. Transport networks also connect communities and allow access to essential social services.Despite increases in private sector investment in Africa, investments have beendominated by ICT, and more particularly mobile telephone services.

They are gradually growing in the energy sector, especially power and gas, and within the transport sector to ports, railways and air operations. Faced with often low profit margins over long time periods, private sector participation in the African transport sector remains limited.The total investment requirement for Africa’s transport sector (to cover both capital expenditure and operation & maintenance costs) is estimated to be $20bn per year over the next ten years.