SIERRA LEONE‘S INFRASTRUCTURE: A CONTINENTAL PERSPECTIVE technology choices could reduce the funding gap by three quarters. While the funding gap is large relative to the economy, there are a number of options for making it more manageable.

The first observation is that this shortfall need not be entirely funded by the public sector. Sierra Leone has already established a strong track record on Foreign Direct Investment, and has in recent years captured 1.4 percent of GDP as private investment for infrastructure (essentially all for the ICT sector). Although not all components of the required infrastructure platform are suitable for private finance (in particular not roads, water or sanitation), other components may be (for example, in ICT, power generation, and ports).

The second observation is that a number of large multinational companies have taken on the country‘s numerous mineral, forestry, and agricultural concessions, and are themselves investing heavily in the necessary transport and energy platforms to support their operations. Sierra Leone has a policy of ensuring that such investments are done in such a way as to benefit the broader national economy, and hence could potentially contribute to meeting the overall need.

Nevertheless, given the size of the funding gap, Sierra Leone will likely need to consider a period longer than a decade to reach the illustrative infrastructure targets here outlined. If the efficiency potential could be fully captured, Sierra Leone could meet the posited targets in about 30 years. However, under business-as-usual assumptions on spending and efficiency, it would take much longer for Sierra Leone to reach these goals.

In the medium term, therefore, Sierra Leone needs to make difficult decisions regarding the prioritization of infrastructure investments. For that reason, to the nation must have a clear understanding of how infrastructure contributes to its national-development and poverty-reduction strategies to provide a clear and objective basis for prioritization. Recent work on the identification of key development corridors for the country could help to support such decisions. Where resources are limited, there is a danger in spreading infrastructure investments too thin to make a real economic and social impact, and the need to think strategically about bundling and sequencing investments for maximum returns.

# The continental perspective

The Africa Infrastructure Country Diagnostic (AICD) has gathered and analyzed extensive data on infrastructure in more than 40 Sub-Saharan countries, including Sierra Leone. The results have been presented in reports covering different areas of infrastructure—ICT, irrigation, power, transport, water and sanitation—and different policy areas—including investment needs, fiscal costs, and sector performance.

This report presents the key AICD findings for Sierra Leone allowing the country‘s infrastructure situation to be benchmarked against that of its African peers. The report provides a general overview of the state of the economic infrastructure sectors in Sierra Leone. Given that Sierra Leone is at present fragile low income country, two sets of African benchmarks will be used to evaluate Sierra Leone‘s situation: fragile low income countries and non-fragile low income countries. Detailed comparisons will also be made with immediate regional neighbors in the Economic **Community** of **West African** States (ECOWAS) countries.

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