FINALLY, the government announced what we had been waiting to hear so eagerly. Transport Minister Samuel Sitta told reporters last Sunday that construction of a standard gauge railway to link the hinterland of the East African region with the port of Dar es Salaam will begin this year.

The 2,561 kilometre long railway, estimated to cost 14 trillion/-, will begin at the port of Dar es Salaam and serve the landlocked countries of Zambia, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda and the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

It will have spur lines to Kigali, Bujumbura and Masaka. The railway project, which is expected to be accomplished within five years, is meant to ease movement of cargo by rail, which is cheaper and carries more freight than road transportation.

The announcement happened after Presidents Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, Paul Kagame of Rwanda and Pierre Nkurunziza of Burundi flagged off block trains to their countries from Dar es Salaam using the Central Railway line.

The block trains are designated to transport exclusively, consignments directly to Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Rwanda and Uganda, without any interruptions or delays.

The cargo will be transported directly from the Dar es Salaam Port to the borders of the respective countries where they will be received by local trains. It is projected that the time used to reach the final destination will be cut down from two weeks to just two days.

The challenges of upgrading and expanding Africa’s transport network are manifold but the rewards are enormous. Across the continent, improved infrastructure of all sorts may increase economic growth by two percentage points a year, according to the World Bank.

Improving transport is particularly important because the cost of moving goods in Africa is, on average, two or three times higher than in developed countries.

For the central corridor, poor transport network is constraining economic activities in Tanzania in other regional members. It reduces competitiveness of the country as an important trade and investment destination as it creates delays and high costs for transport of goods between Tanzania and its landlocked neighbours.

We are excited that the projects in the corridor will help improve a critical link in the regional rail network, which is necessary for both competitiveness and improved regional and global economic integration.

Source: Daily News

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