ABSTRACT
Infrastructure of all sorts plays a vital role in the process of economic development and poverty reduction, and indeed, in making modern life in urban and rural areas possible. The developmental significance of infrastructure is self-evident. Poverty alleviation and basic human need fulfillment require access to pure water, effective sanitation, waste management, electricity, transportation, health services and education. Africa's infrastructure continues to be insufficient and is a constraint on economic development generally. A number of geographic, demographic and political factors intensify Sub-Saharan Africa's infrastructural challenge. Services of sorts also play vital roles in the general process of development but they are seldom given much emphasis in textbooks or analyses of development. Tourism, which is a multi-sectoral activity involving services, infrastructure of many varieties as well as goods producing sectors, also receives less attention than perhaps it should as a possible promoter of economic development. The chapter focuses mainly on railway and road, power generation, and discusses information and communications technologies.
