Infrastructure needs $1.5t

Infrastructure needs $1.5t

WASHINGTON (AFP): Developing countries in Asia will need to invest US$1.2 trillion to $1.5 trillion in infrastructure over the next decade, according to a World Bank report.

China represents 51 percent of those needs, followed by Korea (18 percent), Indonesia (11 percent), Thailand (10 percent), Malaysia and the Philippines (three percent), according to the report "Infrastructure Development in Asia and the Pacific: Toward a New Public-Private Partnership."

The investment input is needed to sustain economic growth, make up for inadequate past investment, and cope with massive urbanization and the globalization of world trade.

The report, issued here on Tuesday, said the public sector had neither the resources nor the organizational capacity to come up with the massive investment needed -- and that the private sector would have to pick up the slack.

Private infrastructure has paid off, the report said, in China, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines in such areas as telecommunications, energy and toll roads, if less so in water supply and port facilities.