The South African government has been ranked thirty-third out of this year’s top 500 global infrastructure owners, up two places from last year with a 0.55% increase in its infrastructure assets to $81.03-billion, as measured by reported net tangible fixed assets.
Three other local entities made this year’s list, including State-owned power utility Eskom, ranked at 142 with infrastructure assets worth $31.25-billion; petrochemicals major Sasol, listed at 357 with infrastructure assets worth $15.35-billion; and State-owned freight transport group Transnet at 376 with infrastructure assets worth $14.71-billion.
This was according to global software developer Bentley System’s Infrastructure 500 list, which ranked the top owners of infrastructure worldwide from both the public and private sectors.
Published yearly, the list made it possible to readily compare investment levels across different types of infrastructure, regions of the world and public and private organisations, providing industry stakeholders with an understanding of the dollar value of assets owned by some of the world’s top owner-operators.
Bentley Systems global infrastructure owners senior VP Ted Lamboo explained to Engineering News Online on the sidelines of the company’s 2015 Year in Infrastructure Conference that, as the list represented asset ownership, several countries’ governments ranked among the world’s top infrastructure owners.
Bentley Systems compiled the Bentley Infrastructure 500 to help global constituents appreciate and explore the magnitude of investment in infrastructure and the potential to continually increase constituents’ return on that investment.
The rankings made it possible to readily compare investment levels across types of infrastructure, regions of the world and public and private organisations.
The combined value of the 500 entities listed in the 2015 Bentley Infrastructure 500 exceeded $16.2-trillion, which was close to the US’s 2014 gross domestic product (GDP) and more than the combined 2014 GDPs of China and Japan.
