Featured tweet, @kofiandah: ‘David Ashiagbor: Africa invests 4% of its GDP in infrastructure compared to 14% by China’

Featured GIF: The Chinese-funded railways linking East Africa (CNN)

2016 PIDA Week: Creating jobs through regional infrastructure development (23-24 November, Abidjan)

The 2nd PIDA Week will be a combination of plenary sessions on the theme, sector seminars, including exhibitions which aim among other things, to provide project owners and project sponsors from both public and private institutions an opportunity to interact and leverage financing for key projects. Additionally, statutory closed meetings under the Institutional Architecture for Infrastructure Development will be held during the PIDA Week. The Infrastructure Consortium for Africa, the NEPAD IPPF and the Continental Business Network Council meetings will also be held during the Week. PIDA Week 2016 builds on the achievement of the inaugural PIDA Week of 2015.

The 2016 ICA Annual Meeting took place in Abidjan earlier this week. Download the background paper: Building quality infrastructure for Africa’s development (pdf)

Infrastructure Financing Trends in Africa – 2015 (ICA)

The 2015 Infrastructure Financing Trends in Africa report (pdf) shows that $83.4bn was committed to Africa’s infrastructure development in 2015, a 12% increase on the 2014 total of $74.5bn. The report details that this comprises nearly $28.4bn of identified African national budget allocations, while commitments from ICA members totalled $19.8bn. Commitments from non-ICA bilateral and multilateral financiers totalled $27.7bn and private sector investment of $7.4bn was also identified. Key findings from the 2015 report include: (i) Of the $27.7bn of non-ICA bilateral and multilateral finance, $20.9bn is from announcements of funding from China. This compares with $3bn in the previous year, but an average of $13.9bn for the three previous years; (ii) 2015 saw reduced identifiable infrastructure allocations of $28.4bn by 44 African national governments, compared with $34.5bn (based on 42 countries) in 2014; (iii) Private sector commitments increased by $4.6bn in 2015 to $7.4bn, of which $7.2bn went to the energy sector (with South Africa the main beneficiary receiving investments of $3.8bn); (iv) Commitments to the water sector have shown a declining trend since 2013.

SAVCA: Private equity playing growing role in funding Africa’s infrastructure gap

Latest figures from the SAVCA 2016 Private Equity Industry Performance Survey reveal that the private equity industry is playing an increasingly critical role in funding the infrastructure deficit in Africa. The survey indicates that of the R165.3bn in assets under management (committed capital plus investments) in Southern African private equity in 2015, around R23.8bn – or 14.5% – are from funds with a dedicated infrastructure mandate. This proportion is up from 7.6% in 2014. Nearly one fifth (23.2%) of the industry’s unrealised investment portfolio in 2015 was in infrastructure. Of the transactions concluded by Southern African private equity managers in 2015, 14.2% were in the infrastructure sector.

Africa’s infrastructure spending drops (Deloitte)

Africa’s infrastructure investment spending decreased in 2016 compared 2015, according to Deloitte 2016 African construction trends report. In 2016, 286 projects worth 50m and more were being built in Africa, down from 301 in 2015. The fall in overall capital value was $51bn — from a total of $375bn in 2015 to a total of 324bn in 2016. The report said there were 109 projects worth a total of $140bn in Southern Africa in 2015. For 2016, project numbers had fallen to 85, worth $93bn. The report identified gross fixed capital formation on a continental and regional level, and compared data collected over the last four years. Regionally, West Africa had 92 projects — the largest number and worth the most at 120bn. SA had the largest number of projects at 41 for a single country, followed by Nigeria with 38. The focus of this year’s report was the water sector.

Sustainable development: EU sets out its priorities (European Commission)

On Tuesday (22 November), the European Commission set out a strategic approach for achieving sustainable development in Europe and around the world. It also set out how it plans to align its policies with the Agenda 2030 and its Sustainable Development Goals. A first Communication on the next steps for a sustainable European future explains how the Commission’s 10 political priorities contribute to implementing the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and how the EU will meet the Sustainable Development Goals in the future. The main elements of the Commission’s new, strategic approach, presented on Tuesday are: [Various downloads available]

Regional before global: a value chain approach to industrialisation in West Africa (ICTSD Bridges News)

These challenges must not lead West African countries to opt out of GVC strategies, but rather to gradually prepare for them. An alternative approach to value chain development that focuses on regional value chains contains transitional solutions to trigger competitive export-led industrialisation in the region. By focusing on the nature of RVCs and the opportunities they offer to West Africa, this article highlights RVCs as a pragmatic stepping stone for the region in order to more sustainably link to GVCs in the future. [The author, Maxime Weigert, is attached to Policy Department of the AfDB]

Afreximbank announces export development fund

The African Export-Import Bank is establishing a “Fund for Africa Export Development” to help African countries respond to the recurrent adverse economic shocks that have affected the continent, participants in the Bank’s Annual Structured Trade Finance Seminar and Workshop taking place in Port Louis in Mauritius have heard. Dr Hippolyte Fofack, Chief Economist of the Bank, making one of the presentations at the four-day seminar and workshop series which opened on 21 November, said that the new fund would have both debt and equity options in order to promote industrialization and export diversification and, ultimately, reduce recurrent exposures to adverse commodity price and terrorism-induced shocks. In the presentation titled “Commodity Price and Terrorism-Induced Shocks: Implications for African Trade and Trade Finance”, Dr. Fofack said that the Bank was also working on a mobile payment platform to enhance intra-African trade. That platform would incorporate a clearing mechanism that would reduce the trade costs associated with the scarcity of foreign currency.

WCO supports Sierra Leone Customs to complete a Time Release Study

Following an invitation from the National Revenue Authority of Sierra Leone, WCO successfully completed a Time Release Study workshop in Freetown, 24-28 October 2016. This workshop was facilitated by two experts from the WCO Secretariat and Kenya Customs who shared their knowledge of the TRS and their experience on developing process mapping and the use of WCO TRS software. The core objective of the mission was to support the NRA in building capacities to conduct a TRS in line with Sierra Leone’s commitments under the WTO Agreement on Trade Facilitation.

WCO declares 2017 to be the year of Data Analysis: The Secretary General of the WCO, Kunio Mikuriya, announced today that 2017 will be dedicated to promoting data analysis under the slogan “Data Analysis for Effective Border Management.” WCO Members will thus be called upon to further promote their efforts and initiatives in a sector that is becoming a key element in Customs modernization process: collecting and analysing data. “Data analysis and related challenges will be thoroughly discussed within the WCO during 2017, and at events such as the Information and Technology Conference, the Global Conference on Transit, and the Technology and Innovation Forum”, Dr. Mikuriya added.

Malawi: Government bemoans low value of regional intra trade (Malawi News Agency)

Joseph Mwanamvekha (Minister of Industry, Trade and Tourism) called on the region take into account innovative ways of financing industrialization saying inadequate capital investment was one of the challenges that has retarded the implementation of the existing programs on industrialization. "This includes urgently formalizing and operationalizing regional development fund, promoting public- private partnerships and ensuring that private sector plays a pivotal role in the implementation of the industrialization programs," he said.

Poultry production and trade in South Africa: a look at alternative trade policy scenarios (USDA)

What is likely to happen to the South African poultry industry now that US poultry is once again entering the country? The industry faces a number of internal constraints to expansion, including high feed costs, labor costs, labor regulations, infrastructure weaknesses, limited electricity and water supplies, and a lack of a supportive environment for productivity-enhancing investments. A severe drought has hampered South Africa’s poultry market by reducing the corn crop by 40% and increasing feed prices. USDA baseline projections (presented below) suggest that throughout the next decade, under normal weather conditions, South Africa’s industry will continue to be unable to meet demand through domestic production. As in the past, trade policies can shift the source, but not the existence, of poultry imports.

WTO’s Trade Dialogues Lecture Series: Findings on the effectiveness of trade-specific and general labour market adjustment policies. Download the presentations from Monday’s seminar: Lucian Cernat (Chief Economist, DG Trade European Commission), Professor Torben Andersen (Aarhus University, Denmark).

IMF Working Paper: ‘A tale of two sectors: why is misallocation higher in services than in manufacturing?’

Building online commerce to its maximum potential requires more trust in the markets (UNCTAD)

E-markets which are growing rapidly - from $16 trillion in 2013 to $22 trillion in 2015 - holds opportunities to generate jobs and incomes in developing countries, connecting both individuals and markets, even in remote locations. But concerns have been raised about the numbers of people who still do not access this opportunity. More than half of the world’s population still has no access to internet, and in Africa that share is about 75%. "We are concerned about the 4 billion people in the developing world who are still not connecting to this enormous and growing global market", the UNCTAD Deputy Secretary General, Joakim Reiter said. "Clearly the lack of infrastructure and access will need to be corrected. Looking to the future, however, consumers will need coordinated international protection from both cybercrime and market power so that they feel safe to buy online," he added, ahead of a meeting in Geneva on internet governance.

Preview of the inaugural Global Conference on Sustainable Transport: what is at stake? (World Bank)

On 26 November, 2016, UN Secretary-General Ban-Ki Moon will convene the first-ever Global Conference on Sustainable Transport, in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan. What is at stake in this capstone two-day event? What fresh developments might it yield, and how might it change the dynamics for transport?

Yesterday’s UNSC hydro-diplomacy debate UN)

Others briefing the Council were Danilo Turk (Chair of the Global High-level Panel on Water and Peace), Christine Beerli (Vice-President of the International Committee of the Red Cross), and Sundeep Waslekar (President of the Strategic Foresight Group). Mr Turk described the transboundary management of the Senegal River Basin — involving Senegal, Guinea, Mali and Mauritania — as an inspiration for the founding of the High-level Panel. Unfortunately, such cooperation was relatively rare, he said, noting that of the 236 shared river basins, only 84 had joint water-management bodies. Some African countries called for intensifying initiatives to manage the shrinking resources of the Lake Chad Basin, which they cited as a factor in the poverty and conflict afflicting that region. Angola’s representative said that amid the scarcity of safe drinking water, people in some countries took water for granted and turned it into a lucrative business. The Lake Chad Basin was a dramatic case in which the link between water and peace was at centre stage, he said, noting that the situation there had led to youth radicalization, terrorism and a huge humanitarian crisis.

Today’s Quick Links:

AfDB scoping study: ‘Women, infrastructure and leadership’

World Bank board approves action plan for Uganda inspection panel case

Mauritius hosts 6th Africa Regional Platform on Disaster Risk Reduction

UNIDO, China strengthen the global innovation network on inclusive, sustainable industrial development

Europe and Central Asia Economic Update: polarization and populism