In 2016, Togo has allocated $297.5 million of its budget to infrastructures, far above the amount allocated to the same sector by most of its neighbors, within the WAEMU, except Senegal. This was revealed in the 2016 report of the Infrastructure Consortium of Africa (ICA), released this month.

While Senegal allocated $575.4 million, or less than 4% of its GDP, of its budget to infrastructures, Togo is in the integration zone, the country to have invested most in the sector, in regards to its GDP.

WAEMU’s economic driver, Côte d’Ivoire, has injected only $64.5 million in infrastructures in 2016, thus less than 0.5% of its GDP. In Mali, Burkina Faso, Benin and Niger, this figure stood at $199.3 million, $179.3 million, $75.2 million and $2.5 million respectively last year.

Out of the overall budget allocated to the reviewed sector, Togo has invested $219 million (73.8% of the total amount) in transport, $40 million (13.5%) in water, $19 million (6.3%) in energies and $13 million (4.3%) in ICT. Non-allocated resources were around $6 million.

Alongside Togo, other African countries to have invested the most in infrastructures, in terms of GDP ratio, are Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Swaziland, all in Southern Africa, and Kenya, in Eastern Africa.

Fiacre E. Kakpo