Biggest infrastructure projects in Africa: 2025-2026 tracker (status, funding, timelines)

Africa's pipeline of active and proposed mega-infrastructure projects totals well over $300 billion in committed and planned capital. From the Dangote Refinery in Nigeria, which became the world's largest single-train oil refinery when it reached full operational capacity in 2024, to the proposed Grand Inga Dam in the Democratic Republic of Congo, a 40,000-megawatt hydropower scheme that would be the most powerful electricity project in human history, the continent is in the middle of a construction cycle with no modern precedent.

This tracker covers status, funding sources, timelines, and investment angles for Africa's ten largest active projects as of early 2026. It draws on company disclosures, multilateral development bank announcements, and government press releases.

The backdrop matters. Africa requires $130 to $170 billion annually to meet its infrastructure needs, according to a February 2025 report by the African Development Bank and AUDA-NEPAD. Current annual investment runs at roughly $80 billion, leaving a gap of $50 to $90 billion per year that costs the continent an estimated 2% in annual GDP growth, per AfDB and AUDA-NEPAD analysis. Every project below is, in its own way, a partial response to that gap.

At a glance: Africa's top infrastructure pipeline

Sources: company disclosures, AfDB, Reuters, LAPSSET Corridor Development Authority, World Bank, Reuters

Energy megaprojects

Grand Inga Dam, DRC ($80 billion; status: preparation phase)

Grand Inga is, by any measure, the most ambitious energy infrastructure project ever proposed in Africa. The Congo River, which runs through the western Democratic Republic of Congo, carries the second-largest volume of freshwater of any river on earth and drops nearly 100 metres over a 15-kilometre stretch near the town of Inga. The hydrology is so favourable that the full Grand Inga development, which would comprise multiple dams and powerhouses, has a theoretical capacity of 40,000 to 42,000 megawatts. For reference, China's Three Gorges Dam produces 22,500 megawatts. Grand Inga would roughly double that.

The existing infrastructure at Inga is a preview of the potential and the management problem: Inga I (351 MW, commissioned 1972) and Inga II (1,424 MW, commissioned 1982) are operational but poorly maintained, operating at a fraction of their design capacity. Both dams have been in a cycle of partial rehabilitation and renewed degradation for decades.

Inga 3, the next phase of development targeting between 3,000 and 11,000 MW depending on configuration, received a concrete push in June 2025 when the World Bank approved $250 million for project preparation. The decision was contested internally at the Bank and opposed by environmental groups including International Rivers. Critics cite the track record of displacement and environmental damage from Inga I and II, the DRC government's weak institutional capacity, and the risk that power from a grid-connected Inga 3 would flow predominantly to mining companies and South Africa rather than the 80 million Congolese currently without electricity.

South Africa has committed to purchase between 2,500 and 5,000 MW from Inga 3, a buyer of that scale makes the project's economics feasible and explains the Bank's interest. The financing structure is not yet finalised; total Inga 3 investment is estimated above $10 billion.

The full Grand Inga development, including high-voltage transmission lines to South Africa, East Africa, and North Africa, carries a total estimated cost of approximately $80 billion. At current rates of progress, full Grand Inga completion in this decade is not realistic. The more relevant near-term question is whether Inga 3 can reach a final investment decision and break ground before 2028. Sources: International Rivers; World Bank Inga 3 factsheet.

Dangote Refinery, Nigeria (~$20 billion; operational)

The Dangote Refinery at the Lekki Free Zone in Lagos State began commercial operations in 2024, confirming its position as the world's largest single-train oil refinery at 650,000 barrels per day of nameplate capacity. In December 2025, a scheduled turnaround upgraded the crude distillation unit to 700,000 barrels per day, per S&P Global reporting.

The scale of Aliko Dangote's approximately $20 billion investment is worth dwelling on. Nigeria had for decades imported the majority of its petroleum products despite sitting on substantial crude reserves, a consequence of the chronic underinvestment in, and political mismanagement of, its state refinery system. The Dangote Refinery was designed to reverse that dependency for Nigeria and supply the broader West African market.

Output through 2025 averaged 18 million litres per day of gasoline, along with diesel, aviation fuel, and petrochemicals. In November 2025, Dangote Industries signed an agreement with Honeywell to support a potential further expansion to 1.4 million barrels per day by 2028, which would make it larger than any refinery currently operating anywhere in the world, according to Honeywell's press release.

The refinery has not been without problems: questions about crude supply agreements with the Nigerian National Petroleum Company, pricing disputes with domestic distributors, and foreign exchange access for Dangote to repatriate revenue from naira sales have generated intermittent friction. But the core infrastructure works, and its effect on Nigerian fuel import costs is already measurable.

East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline, Uganda/Tanzania ($5 billion; 75% complete)

EACOP is the world's longest electrically-heated crude oil pipeline: 1,443 kilometres from the Kabaale oil fields in western Uganda to the Tanga port on Tanzania's Indian Ocean coast. The heating is necessary because Ugandan crude is waxy and would solidify in a cold pipeline. The $5 billion project is 75% complete as of November 2025, according to Reuters, with first oil production targeted for the second half of 2026.

TotalEnergies holds 62% of the project, with CNOOC (China National Offshore Oil Corporation) at 8%, the Uganda National Oil Company at 15%, and Tanzania Petroleum Development Corporation at 15%. Design capacity is 216,000 barrels per day, peaking at 246,000.

EACOP has been among the most contested energy infrastructure projects in Africa for the past five years. Environmental NGOs have lobbied European and American financing institutions to withdraw; the World Bank declined to provide project financing. Human rights groups have documented land access disputes along the pipeline route. TotalEnergies has maintained that the project meets international standards and that Uganda and Tanzania have sovereign rights to develop their natural resources.

For Uganda, a landlocked country with no petroleum export infrastructure, EACOP is the mechanism that makes hydrocarbon extraction commercially viable at all. For Tanzania, the port construction at Tanga and associated infrastructure represent substantial development investment. The political economy of the project is not going to change; the question for investors is whether first oil in 2026 is achievable on current construction timelines.

Transport and logistics corridors

LAPSSET Corridor, Kenya, South Sudan, Ethiopia ($25 billion)

LAPSSET, the Lamu Port-South Sudan-Ethiopia Transport Corridor, is the largest infrastructure development project in Kenya's history and one of the most ambitious corridors ever planned in East Africa. The full build includes a deep-sea port at Lamu (planned for 32 berths), a 2,900-kilometre Standard Gauge Railway connecting Lamu through Isiolo to South Sudan and Ethiopia, an oil pipeline, resort cities at Lamu, Isiolo, and Nakodok, and a network of highways.

The gap between the plan and the current reality is wide. Three berths at Lamu Port are operational as of 2025, with two more under construction. The Lamu-to-Garissa-to-Isiolo road, a 410-kilometre segment, had 88 kilometres complete as of October 2025. The total road budget is KSh 28 billion (approximately $215 million), per Africa Sustainability Matters. The railway feasibility study is complete, but construction on the Kenya segment is not planned to begin before 2027 and is expected to run through 2032. South Sudan and Ethiopia railway segments remain in planning.

The strategic logic is sound: a northern corridor connecting the Kenyan coast to South Sudan's oil fields and Ethiopia's growing industrial economy would reduce those landlocked countries' dependence on overland routes to Mombasa. South Sudan's crude currently moves through a 1,500-kilometre pipeline to Port Sudan in Sudan, a route disrupted repeatedly by political instability. LAPSSET offers an alternative.

Progress has been slower than initial timelines suggested, partly because the financing model (public investment led by the Kenyan government) struggled during Kenya's fiscal consolidation years. The Lamu Port is the most advanced component and is now handling commercial cargo.

Lobito Corridor, Angola, DRC, Zambia (~$6 billion)

The Lobito Corridor is the infrastructure project attracting the most direct geopolitical attention from Washington and Brussels. The project rehabilitates and extends the historic Benguela Railway, 1,300 kilometres across Angola from the Atlantic port of Lobito to the DRC border, and adds a new extension into the DRC toward the copper and cobalt belt.

The US government committed $4 billion toward the corridor in December 2024, with the US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) providing a $550 million loan. The EU and the African Development Bank are contributing additional financing. A 25-year railway concession was awarded to the Lobito Atlantic Railway consortium, Trafigura, Mota-Engil, and Vecturis, according to Reuters and Atlantic Council analysis.

Phase 2, connecting the Zambian copper belt to the corridor, is in feasibility study. If completed, the full Lobito Corridor would link DRC and Zambia's critical mineral production, cobalt, copper, directly to an Atlantic port, reducing dependence on the longer southern route through South Africa's ports. That routing matters for European and American buyers trying to reduce exposure to Chinese-controlled supply chains in the DRC.

The US interest in Lobito is explicitly framed as competition with China's Belt and Road footprint in the DRC. Chinese companies control the majority of cobalt mining in the DRC and have historically routed exports east through Tanzania rather than west through Angola. If Lobito reaches operational capacity, it reshapes that logistics calculus.

East Africa Standard Gauge Railway network

The SGR network across East Africa is progressing on three fronts simultaneously, with Tanzania furthest advanced.

Tanzania's SGR carries passengers on the Dar es Salaam-Morogoro-Makutupora section, which launched passenger service in March 2025 and crossed 2 million passengers in its first months of operation. Freight service launched in June 2025. The line is extending toward Isaka, with a Rwanda connection segment under construction through 2028. The full 2,561-kilometre national network has a 2035 completion target, funded largely through Chinese Exim Bank financing at a cost of approximately $6.3 billion so far.

Kenya's SGR runs from Mombasa to Naivasha. Construction on Phase 2B (Naivasha to Kisumu, 264 kilometres) and Phase 2C (Kisumu to Malaba, connecting to the Uganda border) is scheduled to start in March 2026, per Kenyan Wall Street reporting. Uganda's Kampala-Malaba segment is scheduled to begin construction in April 2026, with a $2.8 billion budget and electric traction planned from the outset.

When complete, the Northern Corridor SGR connecting Mombasa to Kampala will create a continuous standard-gauge rail link for the first time in East African history. The economic impact on landlocked Uganda would be substantial, current freight costs from Mombasa to Kampala are among the highest per-kilometre in the world.

Oil and gas pipelines

Nigeria-Morocco Gas Pipeline ($25-26 billion)

The Nigeria-Morocco Gas Pipeline, also referred to as the Africa Atlantic Gas Pipeline, is the most ambitious natural gas infrastructure project on the continent and potentially the world's longest offshore gas pipeline when complete. The route runs approximately 6,000 kilometres from Nigeria northward along the West African coast, passing through Benin, Togo, Ghana, Côte d'Ivoire, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Gambia, Senegal, and Mauritania before reaching Morocco, with secondary connections into Niger, Burkina Faso, and Mali.

The Economic Community of West African States Inter-Governmental Agreement for the pipeline was signed in December 2024, a formal step that clarified the governance framework for the 13 countries involved. A project company was officially established in 2025, led by Morocco's ONHYM and Nigeria's NNPCL. In July 2025, Morocco separately announced Phase 1 of the domestic component, the Nador-to-Dakhla segment, with an estimated cost of approximately $6 billion, per Punch Nigeria reporting.

Design capacity is 15 to 30 billion cubic metres per year. Financing discussions involve the UAE, the European Investment Bank, the Islamic Development Bank, and the OPEC Fund. A final investment decision was expected by late 2025 or early 2026, though no public confirmation has been issued.

The pipeline's strategic importance is substantial. Nigeria flares large volumes of associated gas for lack of infrastructure to monetise it. West African coastal nations have poor electrification and rely heavily on expensive diesel generation. Morocco needs gas for domestic energy security and as a complement to its renewable energy investments. And Europe, after reducing its Russian gas dependency post-2022, is actively interested in alternative pipeline supply from the south.

Urban development

Egypt New Administrative Capital ($58 billion; Phase 1 complete)

Egypt's New Administrative Capital, a city-scale development project 45 kilometres east of Cairo, is the largest urban construction project in Africa's history. Total investment is $58 billion across all phases, funded through the Administrative Capital for Urban Development company (ACUD), which is majority-owned by the Egyptian military.

Phase 1 is functionally complete. Government ministries relocated to the new capital beginning in 2022, and 4,000 to 5,000 families now reside in the city. ACUD reported total assets of EGP 360 billion as of 2025, with investments in the new capital reaching EGP 50 billion during 2025 alone, per Daily News Egypt.

Phase 2 commences in 2026, with an additional EGP 240 billion (approximately $5 billion) in construction. The city is designed for an eventual population of 6.5 million, across 20 residential districts, with 40% of the total area designated as green space. The architecture firm Dar Al-Handasah is the primary designer.

The project has drawn criticism on multiple grounds: the cost of relocating government functions when Cairo's infrastructure remains stressed; the limited public transport connection to the existing city; and the use of military-affiliated commercial entities in construction contracting. Proponents point to the decongestion benefits for Cairo and the long-term land value creation along the new corridor. At $58 billion in total committed capital, it is moving too far to reverse course.

Morocco: high-speed rail

Morocco's position as Africa's most advanced market for high-speed passenger rail is not in dispute. Al Boraq, the 323-kilometre line connecting Tangier to Casablanca via Kenitra, opened in November 2018 and remains the only operating high-speed rail line on the continent. The 186-kilometre true high-speed segment between Kenitra and Tangier runs at 320 kilometres per hour, cutting travel time between Tangier and Casablanca from 4.5 hours to 2 hours 10 minutes.

In April 2025, King Mohammed VI launched the next phase: a 430-kilometre extension from Kenitra to Marrakech, at a cost of 53 billion dirhams (approximately $5.3 billion), with a maximum speed of 350 kilometres per hour and a target completion between 2029 and 2030, per Reuters. Morocco's 2040 Rail Strategy envisions 1,100 kilometres of total new high-speed rail, with overall investment of approximately 96 billion dirhams ($10 billion). Rolling stock orders covering 168 trains, split between Alstom in France and CAF in Spain, have a combined value of 29 billion dirhams.

Morocco's rail investment is connected to its broader economic positioning: as a logistics hub between Europe and Africa, and as a manufacturing base for the automotive and aerospace sectors whose European customers require reliable supply chain access. Al Boraq carries roughly three million passengers annually and has changed the economic geography of northern Morocco in ways that are still accumulating.

Abidjan Metro Line 1, Côte d'Ivoire (€1.36 billion; 2028 target)

Abidjan's first metro line is a 37.5-kilometre north-south corridor running from Anyama in the north through the Plateau commercial district to Port-Bouët near the international airport, with 20 stations. Construction began in November 2017, financed entirely by France through the French Treasury and the Agence Française de Développement (AFD) at a total cost of €1.36 billion (approximately $1.7 billion).

The project's original completion target was 2022-2023 and has been delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic and supply chain disruptions. The revised target is 2028. Contractors include Bouygues TP for civil works, Alstom for rolling stock, Colas Rail for track, and Keolis for operations. Design capacity is 500,000 passengers per day on fully automated driverless trains at up to 80 kilometres per hour.

Abidjan has a metropolitan population of approximately 6 million and is among the most economically active cities in Francophone West Africa. The current road traffic situation is severe, a 15-kilometre commute can take two hours during peak periods. The metro's 500,000 daily passenger target, if achieved, would remove a substantial volume of car and bus trips from the road network and could materially change commuting patterns across the city.

The Côte d'Ivoire government is also engaged in wider infrastructure work: port expansion at the Port Autonome d'Abidjan and road network upgrades ahead of Abidjan's co-hosting of the 2030 FIFA World Cup (shared with Morocco and Spain/Portugal).

Africa's infrastructure financing gap: the numbers

The data on Africa's infrastructure deficit is consistent across all major sources. The AfDB and AUDA-NEPAD February 2025 report estimated that Africa requires $130 to $170 billion per year and receives roughly $80 billion, a gap of $50 to $90 billion annually. The AfDB's own earlier estimates for its Agenda 2063 infrastructure targets put the required figure at $86.7 billion annually, with 76% of that earmarked for infrastructure specifically, per WAPPP analysis.

The ten projects in this tracker collectively represent over $300 billion in committed and planned capital. Most are funded through a combination of government balance sheets, development finance institutions (AfDB, World Bank, IFC, DFC, EIB, EBRD), Chinese state lending, and private capital. Pure private financing without development finance institution backing remains rare for African infrastructure at scale, the perceived risk premium is too high for most institutional investors.

Public-private partnerships, where a private concession holder operates and maintains infrastructure in exchange for user fees or availability payments from the government, are the model that international investors most readily engage with. The Lobito Corridor concession and the Abidjan Metro operating concession to Keolis are examples of this structure working. Both depend on the creditworthiness of the underlying government guarantee.

Frequently asked questions about African infrastructure

What is the largest infrastructure project in Africa right now?

Egypt's New Administrative Capital, at $58 billion in total committed investment, is the largest single urban infrastructure project on the continent. For energy infrastructure, the proposed Grand Inga Dam complex in the DRC carries an $80 billion price tag for the full build, but only Inga 3 preparation work is currently funded. The Dangote Refinery in Nigeria, at approximately $20 billion, is the largest completed privately-funded infrastructure investment in African history.

What is the Africa infrastructure financing gap?

Africa requires $130 to $170 billion in annual infrastructure investment to meet its development needs, according to the African Development Bank and AUDA-NEPAD (February 2025). Current annual investment is approximately $80 billion, leaving a gap of $50 to $90 billion per year. This shortfall costs Africa an estimated 2% of annual GDP growth.

What is the Lobito Corridor and why does it matter?

The Lobito Corridor is a railway project connecting the DRC and Zambia's copper and cobalt mining regions to the Atlantic port of Lobito in Angola. The US government committed $4 billion to the project in December 2024. It is strategically important as a route that would reduce critical mineral export dependence on Chinese-controlled logistics chains in the DRC.

What is the current status of the East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline?

EACOP, the 1,443-kilometre heated crude oil pipeline from Uganda to Tanzania's Tanga port, was 75% complete as of November 2025. The project is led by TotalEnergies (62% stake) with a $5 billion total investment. First oil is targeted for the second half of 2026.

When will the Nigeria-Morocco Gas Pipeline be completed?

No construction start date has been confirmed as of early 2026. The Inter-Governmental Agreement between ECOWAS member states was signed in December 2024, and a project company was formed in 2025. A final investment decision was anticipated by late 2025 or early 2026. Construction of the full 6,000-kilometre pipeline is a multi-decade project; Phase 1 of the Moroccan domestic segment (Nador-Dakhla, approximately $6 billion) was announced in July 2025 as the first concrete construction milestone.