Transport

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%.

The four sub-sections outline the key issues relating to the four transport modes – ports, roads, airports and railways – and their spending needs.

The AICD study [add link] found that these modes interact, often in complex ways, raising common issues:

• Poor linkages among transport modes in Africa cause long delays and raise costs in the movement of international freight.
• Logistical services are in their infancy in Africa, and their development is impeded by a wide array of administrative, regulatory, and governance barriers.
• Landlocked countries are the most affected by these issues – hence the growing movement toward regional collaboration to facilitate trade along key transport corridors.
• Improving the efficiency of transport services calls for a liberalised transportation market that extends a greater role to the private sector.

(Source AICD)

Commitments to the transport sector, 2006 to 2009

Total commitments to the transport sector in Africa increased by 20% between 2008 and 2009 – from US$ 5.9 billion to US$ 7.1 billion. The North, East, Central and Southern African Regions all benefitted from this increase. In contrast, commitments to West Africa were down by 42% in 2009 compared to 2008.

About 80% of the commitments towards transport infrastructure development came from multilateral ICA members, totalling US$5.8 billion. The remaining 20% percent, the bilateral commitments, were ODA and Non-Concessional loans in nearly equal parts.

AfDB (US$2 billion), WB (US$1.6 billion), EIB (US$1.1 billion) and EC (US$ 0.9 billion) were the top multilateral financiers. The top bilateral financiers were France with US$0.8 billion and Japan with US$0.5 billion respectively.