Are public–private partnerships (PPPs) the answer to Africa's infrastructure needs?

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Notes This could be because of public opposition to the even partial privatisation of these services, or because the risk of non-payment of user fees is high in developing countries. Certainly, the provision of water and sanitation facilities through PPPs is common in developed countries, such as Canada, but nonetheless, very controversial. See Loxley and Loxley, 2010, Chapter 6. This list is incomplete as it ignores, for instance, the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission – ICRC- (Establishment, etc.) Act 2005 which governs PPPs in Nigeria (ICRC, 2011 Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC). 2011. Annual Report, http://www.icrc.gov.ng/uploads/2011/03/2009-Brochure-ILI.pdf Google Scholar). Through the 2004 Treasury Regulation 16 of the Public Finance Management Act (1999) for national and provincial PPPs and through the 2005 Municipal Public Private Partnership regulations of the Municipal Finance Management Act of 2003 (Burger 2006 Cameroon. 2006. Loi N° 2006/012 du 29 décembre 2006. Yaoundé: Fixant le Régime Général des Contrats de Partenariat Google Scholar). The World Bank, 2013b World Bank. 2013b. 'PPP Units Around the World', http://ppp.worldbank.org/public-private-partnership/overview/international-ppp-units#Sub Africa Google Scholar, lists only six of these. The present value of a series of future payments in today's money is arrived at by discounting them by an interest rate each year. The higher the discount rate and the longer one has to wait for payment, the lower is the present value. See Loxley and Loxley, 2010, Appendix B, pp. 189ff. Net present value is the difference between the present value of revenue minus the present value of costs. Real costs of water in Durban doubled between 1998 and 2004 (Bond 2010 Bond, P. 2010. South Africa's Bubble Meets Boiling Urban Social Protest. Monthly Review, 62(2) : June. Available from: http://monthlyreview.org/archives/2010/volume-62-issue-02-june-2010Crossref, Web of Science ® , Google Scholar).