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The most boring Infra news of the year... but still they may be the most important
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Good morning, Very boring news from the Philippines. No megaproject render. No minister standing in front of a bridge that does not exist. No announcement of a new $5 billion airport, railway, tunnel, hospital, spaceport, floating city, or “transformational infrastructure corridor unlocking generational growth.” Just this: The Philippines PPP Center continues to train public agencies, local governments and private proponents on how to prepare, evaluate and manage PPPs and unsolicited proposals. I know. Try to control your excitement. Nobody opens LinkedIn for this. Nobody says at dinner: “Did you hear? They improved their institutional capability for project preparation.” Terrible content. Except… This may be exactly the sort of boring thing that separates countries that announce infrastructure from countries that actually deliver it. Look. The world is not short of infrastructure ideas. Every government has a pipeline. Even New Zealand… The hard part is turning an idea into something that can actually be procured, financed, built, operated and defended when reality arrives. That requires something much less glamorous than a press release. It requires capability. People who can ask the nasty questions early. Who pays? Who takes demand risk? Can the contractor price it? Is the operator real? Is the public authority capable of managing the contract after financial close? And, my personal favourite: Is this actually a project, or just an idea wearing a business-case costume? This is where the Philippines example matters. They are not only trying to create a PPP pipeline. They are trying to build the machine behind the pipeline. Project-development support. Feasibility studies. Business cases. Tender documents. Training for agencies. Training for local government. Training for private proponents. Clearer rules for unsolicited proposals. In other words, the boring infrastructure behind infrastructure. And that is what many countries miss. They announce the pipeline before building the institution that can deliver the pipeline. Then everyone is surprised when nothing closes. Or when bidders disappear. Or when the bids are too expensive. Or when a Market-Led Proposal sits inside government for two years while nobody quite knows whether it is brilliant, opportunistic, unaffordable, proprietary, or just a very enthusiastic PowerPoint. New Zealand and other countries with large infrastructure deficits should take note. Because New Zealand is again talking seriously about PPPs, private capital, infrastructure funding, alternative financing and Market-Led Proposals. Remember this: Private capital does not finance ambition. It finances bankable projects. And bankable projects do not magically appear because someone wrote “PPP” on page 47 of a business case. And I get it… One billion dollars in better project preparation may be less exciting than announcing one billion dollars of new projects. But it may be the difference between a pipeline that closes… And a pipeline that simply looks good in an election brochure. Use this information at your own risk. To solve your infrastructure projects, you can click below.
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Vicente Valencia
Weekly insights on how to perform when it matters | High-stakes decisions. Real situations. No BS. | 👇JOIN +2k readers 👇
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