Mozambique seeks $4 billion for infrastructure development

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Mozambique seeks $4 billion for infrastructure development

7:34 CAT | 05 Jun 2017

Notícias (File photo)

The Mozambican government says it needs up to $4 billion to attract investments in projects that promote the construction of infrastructures for the development of the productive sector, APA learnt Friday. To this end, multi-sectoral teams of the Ministries of Transport and Communications; Public Works, Housing and Water Resources; Agriculture and Food Security and Mineral Resources and Energy meet on Thursday next week in the central city of Tete, in a forum on infrastructure.

The event aims to mobilise national and international partners with an interest in the area of infrastructure to guide their investments starting from development corridors to increase productive capacity.

Addressing a media conference in Maputo on Friday, forum spokeswoman Odete Simeão said that with the event, the government intends to mobilise resources that prioritise its actions in the most disadvantaged regions that, in the short and medium term, can induce the realisation of investments aimed at promoting economic and sustainable development.

“We are bringing about five projects for each sector. Each ministry identified the structuring projects of the sector, will be discussed and memorandums of understanding will be signed for the projects to be implemented,” she said.

The official said that some of the strategic sectors that the government has defined are those of energy and agriculture, having ensured that there are structuring projects that are taking place in Tete, hence the executive considers the province as a potential for development.

Simeon also revealed that during the forum, the construction of the railway from north to south will be presented but noted that it still lacks a feasibility study.

“It is a project whose feasibility study has not yet completed but we think it is time for us to bring this idea and discuss it with investors with a view to materialising it because it is part of the transport and communications strategy,” she said.

The infrastructure forum is held under the theme of “investing in resilient infrastructures to promote sustainable development and regional integration”.

The event, which is a government initiative, will be attended by national and foreign investors as well as the private sector.

About 300 participants from around the world, including China, Portugal, Turkey and South Africa, are expected to attend, as well as representatives from financial institutions such as the World Bank (WB) and the African Development Bank (ADB).

Foreign mining companies are betting in Mozambique on one of the world’s largest untapped reserves of premium hard coking coal relatively close to Africa’s east coast, a prime location for feeding hungry markets in Asia.

Tens of millions of dollars have poured into the only rail link between Mozambique’s remote coal fields and the port of Beira, its export gateway.

But despite the upgrades, heavy rains flooded parts of the Sena line in February, paralysing exports.

Industry leaders estimate that about $20 billion is needed to revive Mozambique’s railways and ports, a massive cost for a country the United Nations lists as the third poorest on earth.

Source: APA