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bne September 2017 Central Europe I 33
$91bn and $84bn respectively. This
is despite the fact that both countries are investing billions of dollars into roads, railways, ports and airports. Ongoing projects include the con- struction of a third airport in Turkey’s largest city Istanbul, tunnels under the Bosphorus and the construction of new railways including a high- speed line between Edirne and Kars.
Overall, Turkey plans to spur spending of about TRY100bn (€25.6bn) on rail proj- ects, new highways, hospital develop- ments, airports, shipping, student dorm facilities, electric energy and urban regeneration. over the next 10 years, Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said in
an interview with Bloomberg in April.
Kazakhstan’s government is also invest- ing heavily to close its infrastructure gap, spurred on by the wish to benefit from the country’s location on the land bridge between China and Europe. Investments in the country include a series of railway construction projects to create an east-west rail corridor from the Chinese border to the Caspian Sea.
Only three other countries from the CEE/CIS region – Azerbaijan, Croa- tia and Romania – are covered by the study. They too will see investment fall short of need, though by smaller
investment in infrastructure dur-
ing this period. However, according
to the report, Asia has a relatively
small investment gap compared to,
for example, Africa or the Americas, indicating that spending plans are expected to cover almost all of the need in future. In China, for example, $28trn worth of investments are needed by 2040, only slightly more than the $26bn the country plans to spend.
The Americas and Africa, meanwhile, have smaller spending needs but
are expected to have proportionally much larger gaps, at 32% and 28%
of investment need respectively.
China will account for around 30% of global infrastructure needs, and is one of four countries also including the US, India and Japan, which will make up over half of total global needs.
In terms of sector, electricity and roads together account for more than two- thirds of global investment needs, as well as dominating investment-spending pat- ters over the last 10 years, the report says.
The widest gap between need and trend is in the roads sector, where investment needs are 31% higher than would be delivered under current trends. For ports the gap is 32%, and for airports 26%.
main driver of the need for major infra- structure investment,” says the January 2017 report. It stresses that “inadequate infrastructure poses major challenges to economic growth”, dragging down firms’ profits because higher transport costs, as well as limiting labour mobility and the population’s access to services.
Turkey, the second most populous country in the region, has an invest- ment gap of $405bn, according to the just-published Global Investment Hub study. Expected investment
also falls well short of investment need in Poland and Kazakhstan, by
amounts; $11bn each in Croatia and Romania and $8bn in Azerbaijan.
Within the last decade, global infra- structure spending has remained relatively steady in relation to global GDP at around 3%. Infrastructure investment also remained more or less flat in the years of the international economic crisis, rising above the usual level of around 12% of total invest- ment, as other investments declined.
Looking forward, the largest invest- ment need to 2040 will be in Asia, which will require over 50% of global
“Asia has a relatively small investment gap”
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