# **<u>Table 16: Improvements in African infrastructure access</u>**

|Service|1990s|2000s|Percent<br>change|
|---|---|---|---|
|Telephone (per 1,000 people)|21|90|328.6|
|Improved water (percent of households)|55|65|18.1|
|Improved sanitation (percent of households)|31|37|19.3|
|Grid electricity (percent of households)|16|23|43.8|

_Source:_ World Bank 2006a.

Compared with other regions, Africa has been slow to mobilize the private sector for the provision and financing of infrastructure. The Infrastructure Consortium reports that private sector interest has gradually spread. There is an upward trend in private sector provision and management of infrastructure, which stood at $6 billion in 2006, up from $4 billion in 2004. Most private flows (84 percent) go to telecommunications and energy. Concessions have now been awarded to operate and rehabilitate many African ports and railways and some power distribution enterprises, but financial commitments by the concessionaire companies are often small. The small commitments reflect both the value of the management improvements that the concessionaire is expected to bring and the limited scale and profitability of the enterprises taken over. An important facilitator in some cases has been the insurance instruments developed over the past 15 years by such bodies as the U.S. Overseas Private Investment Corporation and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency and by the World Bank’s Partial Risk Guarantee offerings.

There has been significant progress in information and communication technology. Access to communications services has increased dramatically over the past three years, with the proportion of the population (excluding South Africa) living under the mobile telephone footprint rising from 3 percent in 1999 to 50 percent in 2006. This increase has been matched by an equally rapid increase in the use of communications services. By the end of 2006, there were 123 million mobile subscribers. Average penetration rates in the region doubled between 2004 and 2006 to reach 16 percent.

**_Integrating the region’s economies._** The small size of African economies and the fact that many countries are landlocked call for regional approaches to common problems: infrastructure in trade corridors; common institutional and legal frameworks (customs administration, competition policy, regulation of common property resources, such as fisheries); and transborder solutions to regional health issues.

African leaders have become more aware of the benefits of regional approaches, especially in matters related to trade and infrastructure. The New Partnership for Africa’s Development has adopted regional integration as one of its core objectives, and the African Union is leading efforts to rationalize regional economic communities. Most countries in Africa are party to multiple treaties or conventions addressing joint development and management of shared water resources (including navigation and fisheries), hydropower, trade corridors, irrigation, and flood control. Progress has been most notable in regional infrastructure, particularly regional power pools (in West Africa and southern Africa) and in launching customs unions (in West Africa, East Africa, and southern Africa). Progress on regional infrastructure is slowed by the technical complexity of multicountry projects and the time required for decisions by multiple 44