Port construction in Africa is about to boom

By George ELIOT 

The continent of Africa (30.4 million sq km) is three times bigger than Europe (10.2 million sq km). However, the coastline of Africa (30,500 km) is more than twice shorter than that of Europe (68,000 km). Africa is a geologically old continent with few bays, gulfs and inlets and its smooth shoreline does not create natural harbours. Tim Marshall identifies the shallow shores as a natural drawback for developing cargo ports in Africa in his book "Prisoners of Geography". 

However, the sea shore around Shanghai and Dubai is shallow as well; yet this has not prevented Shanghai from becoming the biggest container port in the world (47 million TEU in 2021), while Dubai was the 11th biggest (with 13.7 million TEU for 2021). 

There is a saying in Chinese: 分久必合 (fēn jiǔ bì hé: a period of unity follows after a period of disunity). In the case of Africa, a wave of port construction is coming after a long period of lack of adequate infrastructure. This wave is based on a resurgence in interest in infrastructure investment globally, summarised by The Economist in January 2024 in an article titled "Why BlackRock is betting billions on infrastructure". 

Some of Africa's 38 coastal countries are already starting to notice increasing interest in port and infrastructure construction on their coastline. These new ports will also serve the 16 landlocked countries in Africa's interior. Ethiopia is showing interest in the Berbera port in Somaliland (Somalia). Djibouti is emerging as a trans-continental transport hub. 

Invariably, some projects will fail, such as the Chinese idea to build a 20 million TEU port at Bagamayo (Tanzania) which Tim Marshall lauded in "Prisoners of Geography" in 2015; the project was cancelled in 2016. Yet, no one should be discouraged by the odd failure - especially in a startup continent like Africa.

Africa topography map (source: Wikipedia)