Funding issues – delays to Kenya’s major highway project?

Concerns over financing are delaying progress on Kenya’s massive highway connection project. The new highway between the capital Nairobi and the country’s premier port of Mombasa is expected to cost in the region of US$3.5 billion. Construction is being managed by the US contractor Bechtel, which is sourcing suitable funding from private firms and has considerable experience of building highways in developing nations. But the sheer scale of this project, one of the country’s largest since its independence,
April 17, 2018 Read time: 2 mins

Concerns over financing are delaying progress on Kenya’s massive highway connection project. The new highway between the capital Nairobi and the country’s premier port of Mombasa is expected to cost in the region of US$3.5 billion. Construction is being managed by the US contractor 4138 Bechtel, which is sourcing suitable funding from private firms and has considerable experience of building highways in developing nations. But the sheer scale of this project, one of the country’s largest since its independence, looks to be placing a massive burden of debt on the Kenyan economy.

The highway is important for Kenya as well as neighbouring East African nations as the 473km link will provide a faster four lane connection between the two cities. This will speed transport inland from the busy port and help reduce costs, encouraging trade across the region. However, while Kenya’s economy is the most buoyant in East Africa, the cost of project will combine with others already in progress to boost the country’s debt ratio significantly, with some analysts suggesting this could be as high as 58% of GDP.

The financing should be fully in place by June of 2018, with the firm aiming to complete construction by 2024.

Finance & Funding

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • New US$200 million ring road to be built in Belarus capital Minsk
    May 23, 2014
    Minsk is to benefit from a new ring road that will cut city congestion - Eugene Gerden reports The government of Belarus is investing more than US$200 million in the building of a new ring road around the country’s capital Minsk, in accordance with a government decree. Implementation of the project is taking place as part of the existing large-scale state road building programme in the country until 2017, with the total cost estimated at US$5 billion. The new road will measure some 85km long and will feat
    Read More
  • Vandals attack road fittings on key Nairobi road link
    April 24, 2013
    A wave of vandalism has hit a new superhighway from Nairobi as Shem Oirere reports. The newly opened 45km superhighway in Kenya’s capital Nairobi is facing a new challenge that threatens to erode its international standards and compromise the benefits it is meant to generate. A wave of vandalism targeting road fittings has hit the US$360 million highway linking Nairobi to Thika Town, posing a new challenge in the maintenance of the new road infrastructure in Kenya. The destruction delayed the completion of
    Read More
  • Serbia’s pan-European Corridor X is in the slow lane
    October 23, 2017
    It’s been slow progress on Serbia’s Corridor X project. Gordon Feller reports. Back in the early 2000’s, the European Union undertook an ambitious programme to link the main cities of its south-eastern region. This involved connecting five key seaports – the Greek cities of Patras, Igoumenitsa, Piraeus and Thessaloniki as well as Romania’s Black Sea city of Constanta. Initially the plan involved two motorways across Greece. The first was a new 780km route including a branch to Ormenio on Greece’s north-eas
    Read More
  • Increased infrastructure spending
    February 22, 2012
    With economies booming in the BRIC countries and other regions, spending on infrastructure is at a high - Patrick Smith reports As economic crisis grips much of the world, many countries are still spending billions on infrastructure to improve transportation. While the USA and Europe struggle with debt problems (and this has affected much of the rest of the world) the development of highways, airport, ports and other infrastructure is gathering pace in other regions to boost economic developments.
    Read More

Highlighted Content