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Africa’s Poor Water Infrastructure Draws Big Investments

Africa’s Poor Water Infrastructure Draws Big Investments

Photo by Heaven’s Family blog
Photo by Heaven’s Family blog

The issue is how countries can work together to better manage these shared waters. Corporate Council on Africa’s Vivienne Sequeira told AFKInsider that trans-boundary issues came up at their October infrastructure conference, noting that such issues are important “as soon as you talk about regionalization.”

“Clearly, there’s the need to look at it not just as these small pockets of population, but as a group,” Sequeira told AFKInsider.

Cross-border use of water also impacts energy development.

“You need power to get water, and water to produce power in some technologies,” Sequeira told AFKInsider.

However, a July 2014 World Economic Forum report notes “to date, energy and water infrastructure and policy decisions have been made independently of one another, often with outdated assumptions regarding rising demand and resource scarcity.”

As demand for electricity grows steadily while water supplies continue to dwindle, the water-energy nexus is slowly becoming part of decision making throughout the region and opens up opportunities for innovative solutions.

Big Funding Goes to Water

The African Water Facility – an initiative the African Ministers Council on Water and managed by the African Development Bank to help implement the Africa Water Vision 2025 – has been funneling money towards water infrastructure projects since it was created in 2006. One recent program announced on Oct. 10 involves a $2.5 million grant to the Hadejia-Jama’are-Komadugu-Yobe Basin Trust Fund for creating a strategic plan to develop water resources for over 15 million people in Northern Nigeria.

In September, the African Development Bank approved a loan of $91 million and a technical support grant of $10 million to finance Ethiopia’s $2.4 billion “One Water, Sanitation and Hygiene National Program” (OWNP), one of the largest such projects in the world.

In July, Rwanda’s government and the African Development Bank announced support for the African Union-led Kigali Action Plan to mobilize at least $62 million to help finance water-related projects for five million people in the 10 African Union member states of Burundi, Central African Republic, Chad, Liberia, Madagascar, Mali, Sierra Leone, South Sudan, Lesotho and Mauritania.

With the exception of Lesotho and Mauritania, these countries are regarded as “fragile states.” The project includes soliciting direct donations through a crowd funding platform.

In June, the World Bank, African Development Bank, French Development Agency and Japan International Corporation Agency pledged to boost water supply and improve sanitation in Nigeria with a combined financial commitment totaling $638 million.

Countries and private sector are actively developing new models of partnerships to find solutions to the sustainable water funding. There is even support for the privatization of water infrastructure projects in the way some countries have privatized energy projects.

One emerging trend to watch is the focus on water storage and irrigation infrastructure for agriculture to mitigate huge swings in precipitation across the region – an issue expected to intensify from climate change stresses.

According to the World Bank, only six million hectares, concentrated in a handful of countries, are equipped for irrigation. Though this represents less than five percent of Africa’s cultivated areas, these irrigated regions account for 20 percent of the current value of total agricultural production.

Finding bankable solutions to water storage such as Pumped Storage Plants (PSP) for irrigation would not only open a huge market for such projects, it would also strengthen and even widen the agricultural economy.