G20 china_web

Investing in infrastructure
It is a member of the G20's Global
Infrastructure Connectivity Alliance
Its Capability Framework will be
publicly available from early 2017
DAVID GRAY/REUTERS/ALAMY
IMAGE SOURCE
Workers underneath a railway bridge
building project in Beijing, China
The GI Hub
has been asked
to provide
leadership on
the knowledge
agenda
$20TR
The global economy's estimated
infrastructure deficit by 2030
incentives with regard to crowding in
private finance and to report to our Deputies
in December 2016”. This is a key priority for
the GI Hub, with MDBs uniquely placed to
catalyse further inflows of private finance
into infrastructure. MDBs are present
on the ground in many countries and
are trusted partners. They have project
preparation facilities to support learning
and good processes and they have financial
and guarantee-based products to support
private sector investment. With their scale,
they are ideally placed to take a leadership
role in ensuring that lessons learned are
generalised within countries, helping to
reduce the barriers to investment preventing
many countries from progressing.
Partnerships and assessment
The difficult area of cross-border projects
was a further priority of the Chinese
presidency. Together with the World
Bank, which will provide the secretariat,
and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation
and Development, the GI Hub
is a member of the Global Infrastructure
Connectivity Alliance, which was launched
by G20 finance ministers and central
bank governors on 24 July. The GI Hub
has been asked to provide leadership
on the knowledge agenda relating to the
financing of infrastructure. It will also look
to include connectivity-related literature
in its knowledge-sharing resources and
connectivity-focused projects on its
project pipeline.
In partnership with EDHECinfra in
Singapore, the GI Hub has also recently
released a survey assessing the attitude
towards and appetite for investment by
infrastructure investors and advisers.
Important findings included that 65 per
cent of investors are looking to increase
their exposure to infrastructure and more
than 90 per cent are concerned by the
lack of opportunity. Encouragingly, there
is strong investor appetite for emerging
market infrastructure.
Providing forecasts
During the next six months, three priorities
for the GI Hub are the release of the
Infrastructure Needs Assessment, the initial
iterations of the Capability Framework and
the Global Project Pipeline.
The Infrastructure Needs Assessment
will be a comprehensive estimate of 50
key countries, with a global overview.
It will provide detailed global, regional
and country-level forecasts of annual
infrastructure spending, needs and
gaps, up to 2040. The estimates will be
separated by infrastructure sector –
water, power, transport, telecoms – and
will account for the United Nations
Sustainable Development Goals and the
Paris Agreement on climate change. The
assessment will be designed for the public
and private sectors as a platform for policy
reform and investment analysis.
The Capability Framework, which will
be publicly available in early 2017, will
provide a detailed analysis of the capability
of individual countries to undertake
infrastructure development, focusing
particularly on the investment environment,
government capability, public and private
financing, and infrastructure markets. It will
identify the strengths and weaknesses of
existing legislation and frameworks, so as
to help countries maximise their appeal to
private investors.
Pipeline launch
The GI Hub’s Global Infrastructure
Project Pipeline initiative, which is being
undertaken in response to a specific
mandate from the G20, is designed to meet
the private sector’s need for a consolidated
and standardised global database of
prospective infrastructure projects. The
pipeline will present prospective projects
using a common format, to assist users
to make comparisons across countries,
sectors and projects. It will include
advance visibility of upcoming government
projects, and will provide an opportunity
for countries to market their infrastructure
projects broadly on a global platform.
The GI Hub is aiming to have the
pipeline launched with a select number
of initial governments by the end of the
year, with additional countries joining the
pipeline throughout 2017. Like all the GI
Hub’s products, it can be used by both G20
members and all other countries. In 2017,
as well as focusing on deployment of these
various tools, the GI Hub will continue to
develop other new products to help deliver
on its mandate. G20
G7G20.com September 2016 • G20 China: The Hangzhou Summit 135