Co-authored by Oceane Keou and Jose Cordovilla

With the second conversation in our Good Roads Connect Us All series just around the corner, here is a quick look back at the question that started it all.

At the end of June, we launched this new webinar series under SSATP’s Resilient Road Asset Management program, financed by the European Union, with a deliberately simple question:

Who should pay to keep our roads in good condition?

We had a great discussion, bringing together perspectives from governments, road funds, regional institutions, the private sector and infrastructure finance, and the exchange with participants from across Africa and beyond was just as rich.

One thing was clear: there is no single answer, and certainly no single payer.

Roads are shared assets. Governments build and regulate them. People use them. Businesses depend on them. Heavy industries can place significant pressure on them. And when roads deteriorate, the consequences are felt across the economy and the daily life of people.

The cost is measurable: infrastructure disruptions cost households and firms in low- and middle-income countries between roughly USD 400 billion and 650 billion a year globally, and in supply-chain disruptions slowed Sub-Saharan Africa's GDP growth to 4.5 percent in 2021 (World Bank).

But if responsibility is shared, how should the costs be shared?

The discussion strongly reaffirmed the role of governments. Roads provide connectivity and access to jobs, markets, schools and essential services. Many roads, particularly rural and socially important roads, will never generate enough revenue to pay for themselves, but their economic and social value can be enormous.

At the same time, users and businesses have a role to play.

This is where the principle becomes more interesting. Should a passenger vehicle and a heavily loaded truck contribute in the same way? Should industries whose business models depend heavily on particular roads contribute more to preserving them?

The discussion suggested an important distinction between who uses the road, who benefits from it, and who contributes most to its deterioration.

Shared responsibility does not necessarily mean equal responsibility.

More money, but how to use it wisely?

A second point came through just as strongly: the road financing challenge is not only about mobilizing more money. It is also about what happens to that money once it is collected.

Several interventions returned to the same issues: ring-fencing, independent governance, transparency and accountability.

The Executive Secretary of ARMFA AFRICA, the association of African road funds, put it plainly in the chat: everyone already pays, through fuel taxes, tolls and the price of goods; the real questions are whether countries pay enough, predictably, and whether the money is well spent.

Citing the upcoming SSATP flagship report on African Road Funds – Baseline Survey and Maturity Framework, he highlighted that, on average, only about 40% of road maintenance needs are funded, most road funds remain heavily dependent on fuel levies, and 71% of road funds do not use a road asset management system.

This matters for a simple reason. If road users and businesses are asked to contribute more, they reasonably want to see the connection between what they pay and the quality of roads they use.

And there is a deeper political economy problem. New roads are visible. Preventive maintenance is much less so. Yet postponing maintenance does not eliminate the cost, it defers it and often makes it considerably larger.

A road fund executive from Sierra Leone captured this particularly well during the webinar:

“The most expensive road is not the one we maintain; it is the one we allow to fail.” A government may appear to save money by postponing maintenance, only to face a much larger rehabilitation or reconstruction bill later. In the meantime, businesses pay through higher logistics and vehicle costs, consumers through higher prices, and communities through lost or unreliable access.

So perhaps one of our biggest challenges is not simply financing maintenance but making preservation as compelling as construction.

The fuel levy works today. But what about tomorrow?

The future of the fuel levy generated some of the liveliest discussion.

Fuel levies remain the backbone of road maintenance financing in many African countries. They are relatively simple to collect and, for now, remain closely linked to road use. Where the instrument is well entrenched it delivers: Kenya’s Road Maintenance Levy Fund collects close to USD 1 billion a year, as one panelist recalled.

But that relationship will evolve.

As vehicles become more fuel-efficient and electric mobility expands, fuel consumption will gradually become a less effective proxy for how much someone uses, and wears, the road.

Several participants therefore asked whether African countries should already be preparing alternatives, particularly distance- and weight-based charging.

The discussion pointed toward a pragmatic approach: strengthen and ring-fence the fuel levy today, while starting to prepare the systems that may be needed tomorrow.

The same pragmatism applies to private and climate finance. Both can expand the financing envelope. But neither can substitute for well-prepared investments, credible institutions or sound decisions about where scarce resources should go.

Looking Ahead: Who Pays Is Only Part of the Equation

Our first conversation certainly did not answer everything. In fact, it surfaced several questions that we want to keep discussing:

• Should heavy industries and freight operators pay more for the pressure they place on road networks?
• How do we make road maintenance as politically attractive as building new roads?
• Could regional road funds provide a sustainable way to finance major cross-border corridors?
• How quickly should African countries prepare for a future beyond the fuel levy?

Related Webinar Materials:

• Webinar Recording
• Presentation