@misc{35004,
title = {Unsolicited Proposals for Infrastructure Development: Evidence from Latin America and the Caribbean, and International Best Practices},
author = {Suárez-Alemán, Ancor and Dominguez, Enrique},
year = {2024},
doi = {10.18235/0012894},
abstract = {The development of public infrastructure is one of the core responsibilities of any government, as it encompasses the physical foundations that provide access to essential public services such as transportation, water and sanitation, energy, healthcare, and education which are critical for economic development and equal access to opportunities.
Effective infrastructure planning involves understanding societal needs, assessing their scale, designing projects that address them, prioritizing interventions, and optimizing the use of public resources for their development, funding, and financing. This constitutes a central duty of public actors when shaping sectoral policy. Accordingly, it is common and indeed expected for public infrastructure projects to be conceived within this planning framework, meaning they originate as public initiatives.
However, the experience in Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as in other regions, shows that for several decades (and in a broader historical sense, since the beginning of organized development), Unsolicited Proposals (Private Initiatives) have proliferated. In just the countries covered in this documentBrazil, Chile, Colombia, and Perunearly 2,000 PIs have been submitted over the past 30 years.
This document compiles 30 years of evidence on the development of Private Initiatives in four of the leading economies in Latin America and the Caribbean in terms of infrastructure development and private sector participation: Brazil, Chile, Colombia, and Peru. The regional experience highlights the complexity of effectively integrating private initiatives into the public infrastructure investment system. Nevertheless, countries in other parts of the world, applying similar principles, have achieved relatively greater success in developing and implementing unsolicited proposals, reaping the benefits of innovation and efficiency.
After a detailed analysis of regional performance, this document presents international case studies to inform policy recommendations. These aim to create the right conditions under which unsolicited proposals can become an efficient, sustainable, and responsible mechanism for leveraging public resources.},
url = {https://doi.org/10.18235/0012894}
}