Creativity around infrastructure financing not exhausted yet: AIIB

Singapore

WHY isn't more private capital going into infrastructure projects? One reason is because governments are choosing to fund the most bankable projects themselves, leaving riskier, less palatable projects to private investors, Pang Yee Ean, director-general (investments) of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), said.

At a panel forum hosted by the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China and Surbana Jurong on Monday, he said: "Strangely but as a natural phenomenon, the governments always put the bankable projects to be financed by themselves. And then they come running to us and say, 'How about those non-bankable projects? Can you get the private sector to finance?'

"That is the natural way of acting if you are doing the budgeting for the country. So we need to convince them that actually the bankable projects should be financed by the private sector. These are the projects with strong financials, that can produce the yields that will be able to entice the private sector to pa…