The African Development Bank (AfDB), has disclosed its plans to make the Abidjan-Lagos corridor highway a potent economic and industrial hub by 2023, courtesy of the Spatial Development Initiative. The coastal motorway when completed will serve as a link to five major West African countries.

The 1,028-kilometre transnational coastal motorway will connect Côte d'Ivoire to Nigeria, while crossing through Ghana, Togo and Benin. Work is due to commence in 2026 and is earmarked for completion in 2030, the African Development Bank revealed at an online workshop held on Thursday 22 November with all the partners associated with the project.

Under the African Development Bank's leadership, feasibility studies, financing options for the motorway and institutional arrangements for getting the Abidjan-Lagos Corridor Management Authority up-and-running have already been overseen.

The Director of the Bank's Infrastructure and Urban Development Department, Mike Salawou said the transport corridor needs to become an economic corridor:

"This economic corridor approach also naturally overlaps with major urban development. It will support the growth of major economic hubs and improve links between large urban centres, secondary cities and rural areas within the five countries. The Bank has launched the Spatial Development Initiative to enable transformative industrialization right along the highway, to stimulate the growth of major economic clusters,"

The Director of Transport at the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Commission, Chris Appoiah added, "Our ultimate objective is to ensure that the corridor and the economic activities to be developed along the corridor contribute to the ECOWAS regional integration agenda. It's an integrated project which, once implemented, will help us to achieve the economic union we desire in our area."