Uganda railway link 'vital'

4 August 2010

Rail transport will be crucial to the success of the Common Market, which came into force on July 1st with the view to encouraging trade between east African nations, including Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, it has been stated.

Experts believe landlocked nations such as Uganda will need to look at ways of improving their infrastructure in order to benefit more from the trade arrangement, reports East Africa Business Week.

Ramathan Ggoobi, a lecturer in the Department of Finance at Makerere University Business School, said that Uganda's reliance on transporting goods on roads, which are more expensive than rail, could see it not realising the benefits of the Common Market.

He was giving his post-budget analysis at the business school, where another expert argued that the government needs to allocate money for railway transport.

The Kenya-Uganda railway, which stretches more than 900km from Kenya's coastal city of Mombasa into the landlocked country, has not been operating effectively in recent years.

Category: Transport