Prioritizing large dams projects in the West African region/en

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Texte de l’en-tête	Texte de l’en-tête
International Office for Water. Oieau, place Sophie Lafitte BP 75 F-06902 Sophia antipolis (France) c.brachet@oieau.fr	ECOWAS Water Resources Coordination Center, 11 BP 1437 Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso) herve.levite@gmail.om annatengnas@gmail.com ino@fasonet.bf

Abstract

The potential for hydropower production in West Africa has been estimated to be 24 000 MW but only 10 % is currently developed. The rate for irrigation development is almost the same (12 %). Although the region has enormous renewable water resources, these are underutilized mainly due to economic reasons, a fact defined by IWMI as economic water scarcity. Indeed the majority of West African countries are poor and thus poorly prepared for large infrastructure investments and management. However, with impressive economic growth rates (5% to 10 %) and rapid transformations of societies (education, urbanization, democratization), the situation is quickly changing. Given the high level of demand for electricity, food and potable water the construction of new water infrastructures is considered as a key priority for many decision makers. Investments in the sector can also address the need to regulate rivers against flooding and low flows, while preserving ecosystems. The Regional Economic Community of West Africa States (ECOWAS) entirely shares this view with its national partners as well as with trans-boundary basin authorities, crucial bodies in regional water management. Many large dam projects are currently in the pipeline in West Africa. However, some of them have been waiting for a very long time, in some cases more than 50 years. In order to clarify the situation on the status of these projects, ECOWAS water unit launched in 2009, an initiative aimed at revitalizing a number of existing projects: the “Dialogue on large water infrastructures in West Africa”. The idea was to identify the projects that could have the most significant positive impact on regional integration. A panel of independent experts was created and given two major tasks i) establishment of criteria for identifying the most promising structures and ii) application of the criteria and proposal of a list of priority works that ECOWAS could promote. The first phase defined five axes of criteria with the perspective of regional integration; 1) projects should have trans-boundary importance, 2) a criterion on economic integration considered the fact that the structure should be managed by several states, 3) the dams should contribute to regional food security, 4) a capacity to distribute hydro-power to a number of countries should exist and 5) environmental and social changes should be minimal on a trans-boundary scale. Out of 39 projects studied, eight dams were selected at the end of the process. All dams will produce hydropower (a total of about 1000 MW), while half of the structures are multi-purpose dams, also intended for irrigation purposes (a total of about 75 000 ha). Total cost is estimated to be more than $2 billion. The paper describes the process used by ECOWAS water center as well as the many challenges that countries could face while looking to fund their large dam projects.
Keywords: water resources, dams, ECOWAS, regional integration, priorisation.

1. Introduction and objectives