Tag: roads
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Don’t Worry About the Debt, Assures Kenya’s Treasury Minister as Millions Flow Back to China
Kenya’s Cabinet Secretary in the Treasury, Ukur Yatani defended the government’s recent borrowing spree and urged citizens not to worry about debt since the government has a repayment plan. “If you want fast development you have to borrow. It would take us ...
With an Eye on His Legacy, Kenya’s President Pressures Chinese Contractors to Finish Road Projects Before He Leaves Office
Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta is turning up the pressure on Chinese construction companies building three major infrastructure projects on the east coast to make sure they finish on schedule before the president leaves office and prior to next year's election.
Between the Cut in Chinese Lending and COVID, 2020 Was a Tough Year for East Africa’s Infrastructure Development
The financial crisis brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic combined with a curtailment in Chinese lending contributed to a 35% drop in the number of infrastructure construction projects in East Africa, and a 47% plunge in the value of those projects, according to Deloitte's ...
Data Reveals Africa’s Inefficient Distribution of Road Building Projects Financed by China and the World Bank
The Brookings Institution today showcased some of the findings from an earlier working paper by Harvard doctoral student Tilman Graff who studied the spatial inefficiencies of Africa’s transportation industry and its impact on trade. According to Graff, road building projects financed ...
Ugandans Unhappy That Chinese-Built Road is Falling Apart Soon After It Was Built, But the Contractor May Not Be To Blame
Residents in northern Uganda are expressing disappointment that a $25 million, 106-kilometer Chinese-built road is pockmarked with dangerous potholes just six years after it opened. The Gulu-Atiak-Nimule highway is a key transport link to the border with South Sudan and is ...
Amid a Worsening Debt Crisis, Kenya Struggles to Finance New Infrastructure and All Those Useless “White Elephants”
The Kenyan government, like a lot of African governments, is struggling to find the right balance between continuing to pay for badly-needed new infrastructure while at the same time servicing its enormous debts for older projects -- many of which are now so-called "white elephants" that were ...
Chinese Private Sector Engagement in Africa is Going to be Much More Important in 2021 And Beyond
Over the past several weeks, Chinese officials have convened a series of high profile forums with key African stakeholders in what appears to be an effort to lay the groundwork for next year's triennial Forum on China Africa Cooperation Summit (FOCAC) that is scheduled to take place ...
Why the Lack of Chinese Transparency Undermines Trust in Kenya’s Sustainable Development
We were inching along Ngong Road, one of the major roads in Kenya that links Nairobi to Ngong town. Even at 3 in the afternoon, the traffic leading out of the capital was packed with commuters. Street-hawkers use this slowness to their advantage, going from window to ...
South Sudan Closes a Chinese-Built Highway Due to Poor Quality
South Sudan's Vice President of Infrastructure announced this week that construction of the 392km Juba-Rumbek highway to Uganda will be suspended due to quality concerns. Portions of the road were swept away during a heavy storm ...
A Chinese-built Road in Uganda Makes Life a Whole Lot Easier for Local Farmers
In 2014, Longjian Road and Bridge Company Limited, a Chinese construction firm, won a contract to rebuild Yellowknife road and Kabula access road, in Masaka, an agricultural city in Southern Uganda (East Africa). The two roads among several others plus buildings were ...
African Countries Increasingly Turn to Toll Fees to Repay Loans for New Expressways
Both Chinese and African stakeholders are embracing new infrastructure financing models for road construction that both avoids adding to already high debt levels in some countries while reducing risk for Chinese creditors. The Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) model, long a favorite of U.S., European and Japanese governments, now appears ...
China’s Unrivaled Speed Advantage in Africa
With the first tranche of the $649 million financing now available, Ghana is moving very fast to build the infrastructure projects promised as part of the controversial bauxite deal that it recently finalized with the state-owned Chinese construction conglomerate Sinohydro.