New Delhi, Sep 9 (IANS) The UK India Infrastructure Financing Bridge (UKIIFB) Year 1 report, released on Tuesday, highlights strong progress in catalysing sustainable infrastructure investment.

The UKIIFB is designed to enhance the collaboration between NITI Aayog and the City of London and aims at unlocking infrastructure investment and leveraging the latter’s expertise in structuring and phasing major infrastructure projects.

The partnership seeks to secure long-term investment for vital infrastructure sectors in India. Towards this end, the UKIIFB Year-1 Report seeks to build upon the diverse investment and financing system that is long-term, stable, and sustainable with manageable risks.

The Year 1 Report details key achievements and recommendations, including the development of a Project Assessment Framework clarifying investor priorities across highways and rapid transit sectors and advancing sustainability and resilience, integrating climate adaptation and ESG frameworks into project design.

It also presents case studies from flagship expressway and ring road projects, and highlights the importance of creating an investor-centric pipeline, market-tested through the new Project Assessment Framework.

The report recommends enhancing transparency and risk mitigation to reduce perceived investment uncertainties and safeguard investor returns through improved revenue protection and streamlined repatriation mechanisms.

It also comes out in favour of building cohesive project pipelines and fostering long-term relationships with UK infrastructure sponsors; embracing digital infrastructure to improve governance and monitoring, enabling greater investor confidence.

India’s rising infrastructure needs underpin the nation’s urbanisation, climate commitments, and economic growth aspirations. The UKIIFB initiative supports these transformative efforts by addressing barriers to investments and encouraging the flow of “patient capital” crucial for large-scale projects.

The findings from the UKIIFB Year 1 Report reflect a pragmatic roadmap toward unlocking international capital by developing standardised, globally benchmarked project preparation processes; recommendations to broaden India’s Detailed Project Report (DPR) to include full-lifecycle risk analysis, resilience, and value-for-money considerations; piloting stronger risk-sharing and revenue protection frameworks; and the enhancement of digital monitoring and transparency across the infrastructure ecosystem.

As the programme enters its second year, the UKIIFB will focus on refining project assessment tools, expanding sectoral coverage such as green hydrogen and offshore wind and deepening engagement with investors and technical partners, to unlock further capital and cooperation for India’s infrastructure transformation.

The UK-India Infrastructure Bridge marked its beginning on September 12, 2023, during the 12th economic dialogue. This was followed by an exchange of letters between NITI Aayog and the City of London Corporation in September 2024 in London, as part of the UK-India partnership to accelerate sustainable infrastructure development.

–IANS

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