The World Bank's top 10 contractors in 2024

Since its inception in 1944, the World Bank has grown to become one of the most important financial institutions providing concessional loans, grants, and zero to low-interest credits to low- and middle-income countries to support projects across different sectors. In the previous fiscal year that ended in June 2023, the five institutions comprising the World Bank reported a total commitment of $128.3 billion and a disbursement of $91.4 billion. The latest figures for the fiscal year 2024 are expected to come out in the coming months. The World Bank’s procurement activities are also available to the public via a portal, which is updated regularly. Based on the data, more than 26,000 contracts, worth nearly $15 billion, were awarded in 2024. We crunched the numbers to see who won the biggest contracts. How accurate is the data? In our previous analysis of the World Bank data, we found out that the three largest contracts contained significant errors, likely due to incorrect currencies used in the conversion of the original contract prices. We observed similar instances with the latest dataset. After reviewing all contracts worth at least $20 million — which have a combined worth of $5.6 billion — we found three awards with dubious figures. The biggest was for an impact assessment of a climate project in Burkina Faso, worth $148.2 million. Although the contract announcement on the project page shows that the award’s amount in local currency is 90 billion West African CFA franc, or around the same U.S. dollar conversion shown in the data, the main project under which the contract was financed is valued at just $125 million. Moreover, we also find it extremely unusual for a baseline study to be worth that much. The other two contracts with some discrepancies are: • $102.3 million for procurement of physical and environmental control systems in Sierra Leone. Our review shows that the total cost of the main project is $12 million. The original announcement shows that the contract amount in local currency is 2.3 billion Sierra Leonean leone, or less than $120,000 in today’s rate. • $26.6 million for the purchase of eight mobile shop trucks in the Philippines. The project costs $309.5 million, but similar to the first contract we mentioned, the price is extremely high for such goods. We excluded these three contracts from our calculations. We also observed that some suppliers have more than one supplier ID. While this is not too uncommon for large corporations with affiliates in different countries, or for U.N. local offices, it becomes less clear where the suppliers with the same name but different IDs share the same country location. The World Bank does not maintain a list of its suppliers along with their information, which means that it is not possible to independently verify the reason these IDs exist. These may be offices or departments within the main office that can bid autonomously, or another headquarters in the same country. Or the multiple supplier IDs might simply be the result of a technical or administrative error. Overall, we found three of the top 10 suppliers with multiple supplier IDs. These are CGCOC Group, China Road and Bridge Corporation, and TBEA — all based in China. In getting the top contractor, we opted to filter them by their supplier ID. In the case of the awardees mentioned in the paragraph above, we mentioned the other contracts separately without adding their total contract prices. This means that for these suppliers, the total amount could be higher. We reached out to the World Bank and were informed that the appropriate departments are already looking into our concerns. In the meantime, we decided to exclude the three contracts with discrepancies in their amount while waiting for updates. Overview of top-level figures Our findings show that the World Bank awarded 26,205 contracts, worth nearly $14.7 billion, in 2024. In cash terms, this is $600 million more than what the bank awarded in the previous fiscal year. Of the total, $9.46 billion went to civil works. Another $2.68 billion went to goods, $1.66 billion to consulting services, and the remaining $858.1 million to nonconsulting services. China remains the lead supplier country to the World Bank, with $3.3 billion for 283 awards. This accounted for 22.4% of the total. This also represents a $700 million cash terms increase from what Chinese contractors received in the previous fiscal year. India and Turkey also maintained their previous second and third place ranks, receiving $785.4 million and $721.2 million respectively. The other top supplier countries were Tanzania, with $643.2 million; Pakistan, with $458.4 million; Spain, with $424.2 million; Nigeria, with $363.1 million; and Bangladesh, with $346.8 million. Around $748.3 million went to multilaterals and individual consultants. The World Bank labels their HQ as “world.” Their share of the total went down by almost half a billion compared to the previous fiscal year. Although most of the activities were multisectoral, our review of the largest contracts revealed that the bulk of World Bank’s money went to infrastructure projects, particularly those in the transportation and energy sectors. The World Bank’s top 10 biggest suppliers The top 10 suppliers in 2024 won combined business worth $2.4 billion — 16.5% of the total. Both the amount and percentage were nearly identical to the top 10 contractors in the previous fiscal year received. 1. CGCOC Group Headquarters: Beijing , China Total contract amount in FY 2024: $560,212,258.64 Chinese state-owned CGCOC Group is one of the largest construction companies implementing development projects. It won two contracts for construction works, both financed under the Cameroon-Chad Transport Corridor project — $306.3 million for the 227 kilometers N'Djamena-Guélengdeng-Bongor route and $253.9 million for the 350 kilometers Bongor-Moundou-Koutr route. There are two other contracts awarded to CGCOC bearing different supplier IDs: $140.3 million for the design, construction, and operation of wastewater treatment plants, and $20.4 million for construction of a subcatchment, both in Ethiopia. 2. Thales España Headquarters: Madrid, Spain Total contract amount in FY 2024: $343,757,588.22 Thales in Spain is an IT company specializing primarily in the areas of transportation security and defense. It won a single contract, worth $343.8 million, to modernize the signaling system and tracks of the Cairo-Beni Suef Corridor in Egypt. 3. Nice Construction & General Suppliers Limited Headquarters: Mwanza, Tanzania Total contract amount in FY 2024: $316,103,492.65 Nice Construction & General Suppliers Limited, a Tanzanian engineering firm, won $316.1 million for road construction works in Kalambo. 4. UNOPS Headquarters: Copenhagen, Denmark Total contract amount in FY 2024: $283,331,799.99 UNOPS is the U.N.’s primary agency for infrastructure, procurement, and project management services. It was awarded 56 contracts, worth $283.3 million, for services and goods ranging from distribution of emergency agricultural kits, delivery of laboratory equipment, to supply of ambulances. Its biggest contract was for the purchase of 800,000 solar kits and 30,000 street lights in Madagascar, worth $33 million. 5. China Road and Bridge Corporation Headquarters: Beijing, China Total contract amount in FY 2024: $180,832,613.50 Another Chinese state-owned company, CRBC provides works and services mainly in the transportation sector. It received $180.8 million for the construction of a public transport line in Abidjan. The contract is part of an urban mobility project in Côte d’Ivoire’s largest city. Other four contracts with different supplier IDs were awarded to CRBC, worth $64.1 million in total. 6. Qingdao Traffic Construction Group Co. Ltd. Headquarters: Qingdao, China Total contract amount in FY 2024: $160,010,910.46 Qingdao Traffic Construction won two contracts, worth $160 million combined, for the construction and improvement of more than 30 kilometers of roads in Bangladesh. The contracts were financed under the Western Economic Corridor and Regional Enhancement Program in Bangladesh. 7. World Food Programme Headquarters: Rome, Italy Total contract amount in FY 2024: $147,609,134.00 WFP is one of the largest humanitarian organizations in the world. It was awarded several contracts for several services — from implementing school feeding programs in Haiti to delivery of maize flour in Eastern and Southern Africa. Its biggest award was for food assistance to Chad, worth $60 million. 8. TBEA Headquarters: Changji, China Total contract amount in FY 2024: $133,238,495.76 TBEA was awarded $133.2 million for the construction of a grid station in Islamabad. The activity was financed under the National Transmission Modernization I Project in Pakistan. Eight other contracts, worth $259.9 million, went to suppliers with different IDs registered as TBEA. 9. Kalpataru Projects International Limited Headquarters: Mumbai, India Total contract amount in FY 2024: $126,090,328.41 Construction and engineering company Kalpataru Projects International Limited received $126.1 million for the construction of high voltage lines in Western and Central Africa, which is financed under the Cameroon-Chad Power Interconnection Project. 10. UNICEF Headquarters: New York, U.S. Total contract amount in FY 2024: $119,428,187.71 UNICEF won several contracts from the World Bank, including monitoring and evaluation services, vaccine delivery, supply of medical equipment, and distribution of emergency kits. The biggest contract, worth $21.5 million, was for the procurement of cold chain equipment for Burkina Faso’s Ministry of Health and Public Hygiene. Try out Devex Pro Funding today with a free five-day trial, and explore funding opportunities from over 850 sources in addition to our analysis and news content