Investment Scorecard To Track Water Investments In Africa

Staggering $64 Billion USD Investment Requirement

31 May 2022 by The Water Diplomat
PRETORIA, South Africa

A technical working group is currently working on the development of a Water Investment Scorecard to track water related investments in Africa.

The scorecard has been hailed as a ‘game changer’ for the mobilisation of water and sanitation investments by government officials from the 18 African countries that attended a consultative meeting on the scorecard on the 21st of April.  

The initiative for the scorecard was the result of the Continental Africa Water Investment Programme adopted by the heads of state of the African Union at an AU summit in February this year.

Subsequently, in March 2022, at the occasion of the 9th World Water Forum in Dakar, both Macky Sall, president of Senegal, and Jakaya Kikwete, former president of Tanzania, referred to this decision to launch an Africa Water Investment Programme.

The Water Investment Programme seeks to meet the continent’s growing need for water investment. It has been estimated that investments in water security of $64 Billion USD will be needed annually to meet the Africa Water Vision 2025 and the Sustainable Development Goal targets. This figure refers to capital costs for infrastructure development and excludes the costs of maintenance to ensure access to safely managed water and sanitation services across the continent.

In total, the Africa Investment Programme seeks to leverage $30 Billion USD by 2030 towards climate resilient water and sanitation related investments. This investment is intended to benefit a further 250 million people on the continent, while creating some 5 million additional jobs.  In the context of efforts of the African Union to increase infrastructure investment in Africa, a second action plan has been underway since 2020 in which water and sanitation related investments have increased to 17% of total infrastructure investments. This is a substantial increase from the 2% of investments that were water focused within the previous programme period.     

The purpose of the Water Investment Scorecard is to produce an instrument capable of tracking the required investments. It will set benchmarks, identify bottlenecks, and support actions to meet the investment needs. The development of the scorecard was launched at the April meeting. Meetings of the technical team have been held in May. It is expected that national validation workshops will be held in the month of June, after which the scorecard will be presented at the 41st meeting of the African Union’s Executive Council in July 2022.  

Underlying the scorecard is the African Water Supply and Sanitation Monitoring (WASSMO) and Reporting System. WASSMO was established to enable annual reporting on progress made in terms of the commitments made by African Governments at Sharm el Sheikh in 2008 to allocate at least 5% of national budgets for water supply, sanitation and hygiene.             

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