Abidjan Lagos Corridor Highway  designed to withstand anticipated weather changes  – TEC Chairman

Stanley Ihedigbo

Abidjan Lagos Corridor Highway is designed to withstand anticipated weather changes due to Climate change – TEC Chairman.

Chairman, Technical Experts Committee of the Abidjan-Lagos Corridor Highway project, Engr. Ebere Izunobi, disclosed that the proposed Abidjan Lagos Corridor Highway is to designed to withstand anticipated weather changes due to Climate change.

Speaking with journalists in Lagos, Engr . Izunobi, who is also Deputy Director of Highway Planning at the Federal Ministry of Works Nigeria, said the highway will be built to high standards, ensuring its durability.

“The technical meetings we are holding since is  crucial in determining the project’s parameters, alignment, specifications, and design. We’ve started by harmonizing standards across the five countries involved – Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Togo, Benin Republic, and Nigeria. This will ensure a homogeneous corridor with consistent design parameters from Abidjan to Lagos.

“The project’s technical group, comprising experts from the five countries, will advise the ministers on the project’s progress. The ECOWAS Commission is coordinating the project, while the African Development Bank provides funding and guidance on best practices,” he said.

In terms of environmental impact, he explained that consultants are conducting assessments to minimize harm to natural habitats.

“We’re using environmental-friendly materials and ensuring that the infrastructure can withstand environmental challenges for  many years, ” Izunobi added.

Ag. Director, Directorate of Transport Development, ECOWAS Commission, Mr. Chris Appiah, said his office has provided $5 million to support the project, which aims to enhance inter-regional trade within West Africa.

“As we have explained that Abidjan -Lagos Corridor Highway project is not just a road, but economy development tool, and they are other several components in addition to the highway. We are meeting to consider the outcome from the technical review we did last week, on highway design, as well as other components, like trade facilitation.

“The major objective of the project is to enhance interregion trade within West Africa region, and we look at what is required for the highway to be able to perform other function in enhancing trade, among the citizens of the five countries. We have component on special development initiative, which will be used to scope all the economy projects, like the Dangote Refinery company, which is within the influence of scope of highway, to see how they would enhance the traffic in economy growth of the highway with such development. So, under the special development initiative, we have project in tourism, manufacturing, we have major manufacturing hubs along the corridor.

“And the project for industrialisation is also be considered. We know Cote D’Ivoire to be strong in agriculture, so we intend to develop the value chain, right from the farms in Cote D’Ivoire, to industrial zones that will be created along the corridor . It will add value to our raw materials, and the produces will be sell to 400 million people in the region. We have major stakeholders and partners, key which is the African Development Bank, that is providing the majority of the financing to the project and European Union has provided some finanices.

“In the area of trade, we all know the African Continental Free Trade Area (ACFTA), and the five countries are major parties to the treaty. This project is to help our economy and give access to our production centres, to facilities their movement to other countries markets in other part of the region. We are trying to connect West Africa region to Central and East Africa regions. So that we are able to move our  goods to serve the rest of Africa”, he added.