Mapping infrastructure finance research in Africa’s built environment: a bibliometric review

Abstract

Infrastructure development plays a critical role in economic growth, urbanisation, and sustainable development across Africa. However, the persistent infrastructure deficit in many African countries has intensified the need for innovative financing mechanisms to support the delivery of built environment projects. Despite increasing scholarly attention to infrastructure financing, the structure, evolution, and knowledge domains of this research area remain fragmented. This study therefore presents a bibliometric review that maps the intellectual landscape of infrastructure finance research in Africa with specific relevance to the built environment and construction sector. Bibliographic data were retrieved from the Elsevier Scopus database, covering peer-reviewed publications on infrastructure financing in Africa. Bibliometric techniques including publication trend analysis, co-authorship networks, country collaboration patterns, keyword co-occurrence mapping, and citation analysis were conducted using VOSviewer and Bibliometrix. The analysis identifies the most influential authors, journals, and institutions contributing to the field, as well as emerging thematic clusters. The findings reveal significant growth in infrastructure finance research over the past decade, with dominant themes centred on public–private partnerships, infrastructure investment gaps, sustainable infrastructure financing, and policy frameworks for infrastructure development. The study also highlights limited cross-regional collaboration within Africa and identifies emerging research areas such as green infrastructure financing and digital infrastructure investment. The study contributes by providing a structured overview of research trends and identifying future research directions for infrastructure financing in Africa’s built environment.