AfDB signs five-year agreement to use Fidic standard contracts

14th January 2020 By: Tasneem Bulbulia - Senior Contributing Editor Online

Global representative body, the International Federation of Consulting Engineers (Fidic) has secured an agreement with the African Development Bank (AfDB) that will see the development finance institution include the use of seven Fidic standard contracts for the next five years.

Under the terms of the agreement, Fidic has granted the AfDB a nonexclusive licence to refer to the seven major Fidic contracts for projects it finances and the documents may be used as part of the bank’s standard bidding documents.

The contracts include the latest 2017 Second Edition Fidic contracts and 1999 editions, which cover a range of international construction and infrastructure work.

In a statement issued on Monday, the organisations indicated that the move by the AfDB marks another significant endorsement for Fidic contracts from a multilateral development bank, following similar agreements signed with the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, the Caribbean Development Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank in recent months.

“By adopting the Fidic contracts on major projects, the AfDB is demonstrating that they endorse the fair and balanced approach that these documents offer to parties on major construction contracts and we believe this will create more certainty in the market as banks, lenders, investors and clients adopt them,” commented Fidic CE Dr Nelson Ogunshakin.

Moreover, he posited that the AfDB’s endorsement should also provide additional comfort to the financial, institutional and private equity investors operating in the global market to adopt the use of Fidic standard procurement contracts as an effective tool to mitigate the risks associated with the investable infrastructure asset class.