Back to Bujagali. Stepping stone for SN Power to expand in Africa

The partly aid-financed Norwegian hydropower investor SN Power bought a major stake in Uganda’s Bujagali hydropower project in July. Fifteen years ago, SN Power turned down a World Bank offer to become an owner in the project, but now the company sees its newest acquisition as a stepping stone for expansion in the African market, CEO Torger Lien tells Development Today.

Development Today is a subscription-based online journal. To subscribe click here.

If you are already a subscriber to Development Today please log in.

Would you like to know more about Development Today? Click here.

Print this article

November

Doubts cast about GFF’s projection of 35 million lives to be saved

Global health experts question the accuracy of the Global Financing Facility’s claim that it can save up to 35 million lives by 2030. The figure is based on overly-optimistic projections of increased health spending by poor-country governments, they tell Development Today.

The Global Financing Facility (GFF), a World Bank-managed trust fund for health and nutrition, raised only a fraction of the new money it needed to achieve a USD 2 billion target at its first replenishment meeting in Oslo this week.

The donor-funded vaccine alliance Gavi has over the last decade spent more than USD 1.2 billion out of its special fund for pneumonia vaccine, the AMC, on two Western pharma giants GSK and Pfizer. The AMC was supposed to encourage new suppliers to enter the market. Save the Children now wants Gavi to reserve the remaining AMC money for the Indian supplier Serum Institute.

The current Swedish administration, which is acting as a caretaker government, proposes that aid remains at 1 per cent of Gross National Income (GNI) next year, but provides few details about priorities.

Just days after the embattled UNEP chief Erik Solheim announced his resignation, the Swedish agency Sida tells Development Today that it is preparing to decide on a large aid package to the Nairobi-based agency. The funding was put on hold in September in response to revelations in an on-going audit of excessive travelling costs incurred by Solheim and his staff.

Ecological coffee, recycling of plastic from used fishing equipment and digital solutions for enhancing agricultural production. These are among the ten projects awarded grants from Danida’s unique business financing window.

While Denmark has frozen DKK 65 million in aid in response to the anti-gay crackdown in Dar es Salaam, Norway is opting for diplomacy. Norwegian Development Minister Nikolai Astrup will raise his concern about the rise of homophobia during his visit to Tanzania this week, but withholding aid is not on his agenda.

Back to Bujagali. Stepping stone for SN Power to expand in Africa

November

Related articles