September 1, 2010

Libya’s construction boom picks up slack from Dubai slowdown

BENGHAZI, Libya

In the outskirts of this city, Libya’s second largest, row after row of sand-colored concrete apartment blocks and villas are sprouting from the desert.

Hundreds of kilometres away, construction cranes dot the Mediterranean skyline of the capital, Tripoli.

The multibillion dollar construction frenzy taking place is the latest and most visible sign of Libya’s drive for growth.

It’s a push that largely ignored the global financial meltdown that left other oil-rich Arab nations stumbling over the last couple of years, and reflects how Libya is tapping its oil wealth to reshape a country isolated for years by sanctions and international disdain.

Libya is “really trying to become, for lack of a better term, a new Dubai,” aid Carlos Caceres, a representative of the U.S.-based engineering giant AECOM working in Benghazi. He was referring to the United Arab Emirate sheikdom whose stratospheric rise was rivaled only by its staggering debt woes.

AECOM is overseeing a US$80 billion project to build 160,000 housing units throughout the country, about a quarter of which will be in Benghazi, and refurbishing sewage and paving roads there. Overall, however, Libya plans to spend $500 billion over the next decade on a host of projects.

New universities are being planned, Tripoli’s shabby airport is being overhauled, new Toyota and Honda sedans abound in the streets and trendy cafes dot street corners.

The International Monetary Fund forecasts Libya’s economy will grow by 5.4 per cent this year, while the U.N. said foreign direct investment into the country quadrupled from $1 billion in 2005 to $4.1 billion in 2008.

“It’s absolutely the boom country at the moment,’’ said Richard Barber, a British supervisor with HanmiParsons, a South Korea-based construction management company. “So many engineers from Dubai and the rest of the Mideast are coming here now and finding work, including me.’’

The country’s surge sits in stark contrast to the Libya of just over decade ago, when it was struggling under international and U.S. sanctions linked to Libyan leader Muammar Gadhafi’s support for terrorism and the country’s weapons of mass destruction program.

Gadhafi’s decision to renounce terrorism, hand over the two suspects wanted for the 1988 airline bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland, and pay compensation to the families of the 270 people killed in the attack paved the way for Libya’s re-entry into the international community.

The U.S. restored relations and reopened its embassy, American and European oil firms have flocked to the country, home to Africa’s largest proven oil reserves.

Throughout Benghazi, new sewage pipes and electrical lines are being laid. In Tripoli, Turkey’s EMSAS Construction is working on a $1.3 billion luxury high-rise complex along the road to the city’s airport. The Bab Tripoli complex, to be completed in November, will include 2,000 apartments and a hospital.

Another Turkish firm, TAV Construction is working with Athens-based Consolidated Contractors Co. to finish the revamping of Tripoli’s international airport by next March.

Associated Press

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