The African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) on Tuesday in Cairo presented an intra-African Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) platform designed to empower African contractors to bid for contracts successfully.
This allows for the seamless posting of key infrastructure projects within the EPC space in Africa for bidding by EPC companies.
The presentation, which took place during a workshop organised on the sidelines of the third Intra-African Trade Fair (IATF2023), also covered various products, programmes and initiatives developed by Afreximbank to support local companies engaged in infrastructure contract bidding.
Addressing the workshop, Kanayo Awani, executive Vice President of Intra-African Trade Bank at Afreximbank, said that the workshop’s objective was to promote African participation in large-scale African infrastructure projects and to promote the award of EPC contracts to African entities.
“We believe that this specialized capacity building programme will enable African contractors to bid for construction projects on the continent and beyond successfully,” she said.
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The workshop was held to share the results of a survey on challenges faced by African contractors and the critical success factors in winning projects. It also featured presentations of success stories from companies that previously received support from Afreximbank, including Mota Engil, Elsewedy and Hassan Allam.
In their presentations, the company representatives highlighted the need for African countries to allow for the movement of labour across borders so that EPC contractors could bring in workers from other African countries where expertise existed. They also said that including local content requirements in EPC contracts would help to encourage the use of local contractors and enhance capacity building.
The workshop was capped off with the signing of facility agreements valued at US$200 million with Hassan Allam; US$30 million with Grainer Angola; US$50 million with DOTT Services; US$200 million with Arab Contractors; US$200 million with FDI; and US$300 million with Elsewedy.
IATF2023, Africa’s largest trade and investment fair, opened on November 9 and will run till November 15.
