Hurdles to PPP investments
This paper discusses some of the most frequent hurdles to delivering public investment projects through public-private partnerships (PPPs) in Europe. It summarizes contributions made by the European PPP Expertise Centre (EPEC) in several fora in the context of discussions on the Third Pillar of the Investment Plan for Europe. The hurdles addressed in this paper are illustrative of the kind of issues the European PPP market faces rather than an exhaustive representation of them. Many hurdles are linked to the underlying investment projects (e.g. poorly prepared projects, delays/failure to obtain authorizations, poorly conducted public consultation processes) rather than to their delivery as PPPs. This paper does not discuss these project hurdles, which in themselves can be significant.
Many factors can inhibit the successful delivery of PPP projects. It is realistic to assume that the effective resolution of most of the PPP hurdles is a task of Member States rather than European authorities. In mature PPP mar- kets, governments and procuring authorities have found ways to address a number of these con- straints. Experience shows that some of these hurdles can be resolved if there is political will.
