TED Webinar “Steering Clear of Corruption: Embedding Transparency in Global Gateway Transport & Infrastructure”

Transport and infrastructure are highly susceptible to corruption due to massive financial volumes, multiple actors, and technical complexities. Globally, an estimated 10% to 30% of total investment value in infrastructure is lost to corruption. Beyond direct financial losses, corruption distorts public priorities, leading to the selection of highly visible "white elephant" projects over critical maintenance or sustainable infrastructure, thereby negatively affecting climate goals and citizen welfare. The moderator of the event, Daniela Patiño Piñeros from Transparency International, highlighted that given the points above we need to consider fighting corruption in the transport sector as a key development issue and not only a financial control issue.

Representing DG INTPA, Jean-Pierre Sacaze highlighted that the EU is mobilizing €400 billion by 2027 through the Global Gateway strategy to build sustainable transport networks, emphasizing that integrity must be a core design feature rather than an add-on. To safeguard these high-risk investments from corruption, he focused on five practical, interconnected measures: implementing joint needs assessments to identify genuine gaps and prevent politically driven project selection; ensuring early project preparation to minimise opacity and fragmentation; embedding strict governance and competitive procurement standards directly into the EU offer; using multiple instruments to build the institutional capacity of local regulators and anti-corruption bodies; and applying a unified, "whole-of-delegation" approach to coordinate oversight within EU Delegations. Ultimately, Sacaze concluded that deploying these steps transforms joint monitoring and information sharing into proactive integrity tools, making systemic risks much harder to ignore. On the better analysis and understanding of risks and how to mitigate them, he pointed towards the DG INTPA Anti-corruption guidance notes for the Global Gateway sectors.

Insights from the Field: Systemic risks and proven solutions

• Martin Benderson on behalf of The Maritime Anti-Corruption Network (MACN) detailed how maritime corruption functions as a hidden, daily tax on the transport system which is why it needs to be treated as a development issue. With over 70,000 incidents reported across more than 1,350 ports showing the issue is truly endemic, the network strongly advocates for public-private collective action – as no single individual actor can solve it alone. In Nigeria, where corruption added 15% to total transport costs and an average of USD 182,000 per vessel, MACN helped implement a real-time Anti-Corruption Help Desk. This mechanism, coupled with procedural reforms, successfully reduced reported incidents by 66% since 2019. The model is now being replicated in Egypt, India, Ukraine and Indonesia. In the context of Global Gateway, this shows that the work doesn’t end by only building infrastructure – the process of trade itself and how it is governed is equally important for a fair economic outcome for all parties. 
• From the CoST – Infrastructure Transparency Initiative, Evelyn Hernandez highlighted that governance risks—not technical or financial issues—are the primary threats to infrastructure delivery. Opacity often shifts from the procurement stage to contract management and execution, where most financial losses occur. Utilizing independent assurance and standardized open data has proven highly effective; for example, independent reviews in Ukraine increased open competition on road contracts from 53% to 96%, while transparency measures in Thailand generated roughly USD 72 million in savings. 
• Our members at Open Contracting Partnership (OCP), represented by Karolis Granickas addressed the critical "blind spots" in project delivery. Moreover, for specific mitigation to these points, he recommended to 1) have stronger data transparency conditionality for GG projects, 2) contractor integrity measures, including clear beneficial ownership data, 3) real-time publication of contract amendment data where the risks are highest and 4) strengthening the capacity of EU delegations to monitor procurement awards and changes done at the partner-country level. He presented Ukraine's DREAM system (Digital Reconstruction Ecosystem for Accountable Management) as a blueprint: it successfully tracks the complete infrastructure lifecycle in a single pipeline—from damage assessment and budget planning to procurement and delivery tracking. 
• As a first-time guest to TED events, Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) shared their latest report on the Lobito Corridor which is to connect Angola, the DRC, and Zambia. Solofo Rakotoseheno framed strategic infrastructure corridors as comprehensive governance systems, not just physical investments. The report indicated several key gaps which are directly linked to integrity risks: fragmented oversight, uneven disclosure, complex concession arrangements and limited visibility around procurement or tariffs. Corridor competitiveness and fair economic development for the communities relies on investment predictability, coordinated institutional oversight, and transparent, multi-stakeholder participation that ensures local communities benefit from the trade systems. 

Speakers converged on several actionable recommendations to safeguard future transport and infrastructure investments:

• Governance, transparency, and integrity must be integrated as core design features of transport infrastructure projects from the very beginning. The projects themselves, especially part of a corridor-development, should be considered as a comprehensive governance initiative.
• Integrity mechanisms and principles embedded in the project design and implementation should set stage for a transparent, accountable operations once the infrastructure is put in place. Corruption creates damages in the process of trading with equal efficiency as in the stage of building a project.
• Access to funding should be linked to data conditionality, requiring the publication of standardized, usable open data across the entire project lifecycle, from planning through to maintenance. 
• Beneficial ownership transparency must be a mandatory requirement at contract signature for major contractors and key subcontractors to prevent market capture and hidden conflicts of interest. 
• All post-award contract amendments and their justifications should be published in real time, particularly in fragile environments where amendment abuse is prevalent. 
• Multi-stakeholder accountability models—bringing together the public sector, private companies, and civil society—are essential to transform data transparency into actual, enforceable accountability.