If India is to move in its high growth trajectory over the next 8 years, the Indian construction industry is likely to witness a huge shortage of skills. The supply of skilled human resources required by the construction industry will fall short by 55 to 64 percent. To meet this demand, the number of civil engineering graduates and diploma holders would have to go up by at least a factor of 3, says a new World Bank study. Join discussion...

As if addressing the infrastructure challenge wasn’t already a big enough task for many national governments around the world, some nagging doubts persist amongst the private sector about those governments’ ability to get the job done, according to a research released by KPMG recently. Join discussion...

Fitch Ratings has today said that given India's ever widening physical and social infrastructure deficit, universally recognised as major bottlenecks to sustained economic growth, the expectations that the Budget for FY10 presented in Parliament today would provide a fillip to the sector were very high. Join discussion...

$192 billion. That is the number of stimulus dollars requested for infrastructure projects in New York state - from a federal allocation of just $3.9 billion. Over the next 20 years, New York will fall $100 billion short of its highway and bridge funding requirements just to maintain, let alone improve, our current system. The Metropolitan Transit Authority alone faces an unfunded $25 billion, five-year capital program. Join discussion...

$192 billion. That is the amount requested for infrastructure projects in New York state, from a federal allocation of $3.9 billion. Over the next 20 years, the state will fall $100 billion short of its highway and bridge funding requirements just to maintain, let alone improve, our current system. Join discussion...

Public private partnerships (P3s) waste public money because it costs substantially more to raise capital for public infrastructure indirectly through a P3 than directly through public borrowing, according to a report released Monday by the Ontario Council of Hospital Unions (OCHU/CUPE). Join discussion...

For three years since the adoption of the Public-Private Partnership Act in 2005, no meaningful initiative has been taken towards its implementation. It has therefore become necessary to adopt a new law, writes independent economic expert Jerzy Bolkowski in a commentary for Polish Market. The PPP Act adopted on 19 December 2008 defines cooperation between public entities and private partners as ”joint execution of projects with both sides sharing the tasks and risks”. Join discussion...

This week a report was released by the New York Commission on State Asset Maximization. You can download the full report here. This Commission was designed by New York´s Governor Paterson to explore innovative financing mechanisms for infrastructure developments. In other words, New York is affected by a critical budget shortfall and the state also has to face growing and growing infrastructure investment needs, so basically they need the private sector to inject money into state assets through "Public private partnerships" (P3s). And this Commision is in charged of detecting suitable candidates for these P3s structures. Join discussion...

s much as £2.4bn could be saved if the NHS bought out the private finance contracts signed by the government to build new hospitals, an economic study has claimed. Labour's enthusiasm for public finance initiatives (PFIs) has wasted national reserves and enriched private investors, the report by a University of East Anglia academic alleges. Join discussion...

Indian Railways sector offers an investment opportunity of a whopping Rs 2.7 lakh crore over the next five to eight years, a report says. "Opportunities in the Railway sector are close to Rs 2.7 trillion over the next five to eight years, of which the Rs 800-900 billion will be awarded in the next two years," global financial services provider BNP Paribas said in a report. Join discussion...