WASHINGTON, 5 October 2010: At the recent Millennium Development Goals Summit in New York, several prominent experts gathered to discuss the importance of closing Africa’s enormous infrastructure gap.
– If you look at just about any of the MDGs, you will find that infrastructure is the fundamental need and the binding constraint, said Jeffrey Sachs, Special Adviser to the UN Secretary General, who chaired a panel that included Abdoulaye Wade, President of Senegal, Jean Ping, Chair Person of the African Union Commission, and Donald Kaberuka, President of the African Development Bank.
Obiageli Ezekwesili, World Bank Vice-President for Africa noted that the Bank’s infrastructure lending to Sub-Saharan Africa for the recently concluded fiscal year had increased sharply to over 7,5 billion US dollar. – Our partners have also all increased their lending for infrastructure, yet we still have to bridge a huge deficit, she said.
Since 2006, the China Development Bank has been increasing its presence as another important financing partner for other developing countries. – We are very keen on expanding our investment and involvement in Africa—the continent with the most development potential, said Gu Yang, the China Development Bank’s Advisor to the Governor for International Cooperation.
In a region which is highly disadvantaged by its economic geography—especially by its numerous small states with relatively closed borders—cooperative action becomes more important than ever. – Regional integration is at the heart of solving the infrastructure deficit on the continent, Ezekwesili said.
The China Development Bank agreed, sending a strong message to Africa on the need for more open borders. – As a financier we need scale, we are interested in building trunk roads and railways, said GuYang, and continued: – If you want big-scale infrastructure, keep your country borders open 24 hours.
For many African countries, the only cost-effective way to improve their national infrastructure endowment is through regional collaboration with their neighbours in areas such as power trade, road corridors, submarine cables, or trans-boundary water resources.
If a “Marshall Plan” for infrastructure in Africa were to be adopted, the region would need to do things differently, especially in terms of eliminating all the inefficiencies that stand in the way of the private sector.
– We estimate that about17 billion US dollar is being wasted annually due to inefficiencies,” said Ezekwesili. – Just removing the policy drags that create these inefficiencies would lead to a maximization of existing investments in infrastructure.
Infrastructure and the MDGs: a single agenda
Asked after the event why infrastructure is important for women, Elham Ibrahim, African Union Commissioner for Infrastructure and Energy, raised a number of emphatic points.
– How will women get rid of diseases and get healthy without water that is suitable for drinking, how will they keep their children clean; how can they educate their children and raise the standard of education without electricity? she asked. – Without energy sources, they are using wood for cooking; this means so much pollution which affects their health. All these infrastructure components are really very essential for achieving the MDGs.”
As Ibrahim noted, a lack of infrastructure has been hampering progress towards many of the broader development objectives outlined by the MDGs. Notably, only five African countries have met the target for access to safe water, with only 12 other countries likely to do so, on current trends.
– The infrastructure agenda and the MDGs agenda are not different, concluded Ezekwesili, – In fact, infrastructure is central to the MDG agenda in Africa.
