India in top five emerging economies in private infra investment

Despite investment in India declining to a nine-year low in 2014, India has figured in top five emerging economies for highest investment commitments in the private sector infrastructure sectors, the World Bank has said.

"Investment in India reached a nine-year low in 2014, falling to $6.2 billion," said an update released on the World Bank's "Private Participation in Infrastructure" database.

It said Chinese investment in 2014 at $2.5 billion had declined to its lowest level since 2010.

"Our update reveals that the top five countries with the highest investment commitments in 2014 are Brazil, Turkey, Peru, Colombia and India," Clive Harris, practice manager, Public-Private Partnerships, World Bank Group, said here on Tuesday.

"These five countries together attracted $78 billion, representing 73 percent of the investment commitments in the developing world in 2014," he added.

Total infrastructure investments in 139 emerging economies, for projects with private participation, rose to $107.5 billion in 2014, which was largely by increasing activity in Brazil, the World Bank said.

Sub-Saharan Africa saw an especially steep fall from $9.3 billion in 2013 to $2.6 billion in 2014 because of a drop in energy sector activity.

"However, 2014's figure was closer to levels seen before 2012, and the emergence of activities in countries such as Ghana, Kenya and Senegal is particularly encouraging," the bank said.

The increase in the global investment commitments is mainly from greater activity in the Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) region, which captured $69.1 billion, most of which from investment commitments in Brazil, Colombia and Peru.