Senegal Infrastructure

For a developing nation, Senegal has a well organized infrastructure compared to most other African countries.
Senegal should almost double investment in public works projects to improve transport times and power supplies, enabling private industry to realize its “enormous” growth potential, said Clemencia de Mastle, a World Bank official.

The West African country needs to invest 20 %of its gross domestic product in transport and energy projects, the bank’s coordinator for infrastructure diagnosis told a conference in the capital, Dakar, today.

Poor infrastructure costs Senegal per capita GDP growth of 1.3 percentage points each year, with average transport speeds of less than 6 kilometers (3.7 miles) an hour, de Mastle said, citing an Africa-wide investigation of public services.

Senegal needs to add generating capacity of at least 258 megawatts, with consumers currently relying on private generators for 25 percent of their power needs, up from 7 percent at the beginning of the decade, the study found.

The country is currently investing $911 million in public works projects a year, including power plants and a system of highways around the capital, an amount that is just 55 percent of the World Bank’s suggested infrastructure spending, according to the report.