The green transition requires massive investments in energy, digital, and transport connectivity to fill the gap in developing countries. At the same time, infrastructure projects are becoming weaponised by rival powers seeking to extend their influence abroad through the construction of railways, undersea cables, or renewable energy plants. China has been the pioneer in this effort, through its massive investment plan, the Belt and Road Initiative. The G7, conscious of the necessity to answer China’s infrastructural offensive and to mend ties with the global south, has launched the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investments. Italy, as G7 president, aims to be a bridge builder – literally and metaphorically – and is developing routes alternative to those sponsored by China.

In this episode, Alberto Rizzi, policy fellow at ECFR and author of the recent report on the India-Middle East-Europe economic corridor, and Mohammed Soliman, director of the strategic technologies and cyber security programme at the Middle East Institute, discuss the importance of infrastructures and connectivity in the current fragmented global order.

This podcast was recorded on 16 May 2024