Only 9,000km of Tanzanian roads are paved.
Investing in East Africa's road sector to boost economic development
Investments in East Africa’s road sector are helping drive economic development as well as political stability
Finance & Funding / April 14, 2020 3 mins Read
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By Shem Oirere
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New roads will help boost economic activity in East Africa
The economies of East Africa have been growing in the last five years, exerting pressure on the existing road network whose expansion has not kept pace with the increasing gross domestic product (GDP) largely because of inadequate financing. In spite of the growing economies in East Africa, governments in the region continue missing revenue collection targets while increasing both recurrent and development expenditure with more reliance on external financing to meet their infrastructure demand amid growing interest in public private partnership (PPP) as the other funding option.
Tanzania's economic growth was estimated at 6.5% for 2017 with analysts projecting a 6.7% and 6.9% growth in 2018 and 2019 respectively, while in Kenya the growth was about 5% in 2017 with projections of 5.6% and 6.2% for 2018 and 2019 respectively. Both Uganda and Rwanda expect an economic expansion of 5.9% and 7.2% respectively for 2018 up from 4.8% and 6.1% respectively in 2017. Further growth is projected by the two countries in 2019 at rate of 6% and 7.5% respectively.
Each country in the region has prioritised infrastructure expansion, upgrading and maintenance in their respective national budgets that continue posting increasing deficits that hamper these government's capacity to finance capital projects especially in the road sector.
Currently, unpaved roads comprise the largest share in East Africa's road network while the list of those that are not maintained or impassable continues to grow longer even with increased financial support from the World Bank, African Development Bank and a mix of loans from China, Japan, European Investment Bank and AFP.
For example in Tanzania, only 9,951km or 27% of the country's 36,258km classified national road network is paved. The country's State-run roads agency, Tanzania National Roads Agency (TANROADS) dreams of paving an additional 4,000km by 2022.
During the 2018/19 fiscal year, Tanzania plans to spend an estimated US$655 million on development of 62 roads linking districts and regions as part of the $1.8 billion budget allocation for the Ministry of Works, Transport, and Communication.These road projects are part of TANROADS' 2016-2021 five-year strategic plan under which the State-run agency will construct, upgrade and rehabilitate a total of 188 roads.
Within the five years, TANROADS, which has spent $2.1 billion on road development and maintenance since 2015, also hopes to construct or upgrade 76 trunk roads of 3,398km and 112 regional roads of 5,3318km. An additional 1,683km of trunk roads will be rehabilitated and 29km of regional roads by 2021. These are in addition to the construction of 21 bridges, rehabilitation of two others and construction of 18 flyover/interchanges/junctions over the five-year period.
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