CONTENTS | ANB-BIA HOMEPAGE | WEEKLY NEWS
|
Malawi |
TRANSPORT
Since June 1995, Malawi has spent millions of dollars in the construction and rehabilitation of its rural road network, but to-day mobility in rural areas is still a major problem
Most roads in rural areas are impassable even during the dry season, and some of those that have been fully rehabilitated lack adequate transport facilities for people anxious to get to their destinations.
When the ruling United Democratic Front (UDF) party assumed power in the country’s first democratic general elections in 1994, one of its earliest achievements was the establishment in July 1995, of the donor-supported Malawi Social Action Fund (MASAF) project. MASAF, which started out with a 66 million US dollar credit from the International Development Agency (IDA) before the World Bank (WB) chipped in with another loan of 66 million dollars, has been a key poverty alleviation instrument, designed to address community social needs. This is achieved through the financing of community-initiated self-help projects and cash transfer safety net activities.
The Public Works Programme (PWP) is one of MASAF‘s project components, which among other functions is involved in the rehabilitation and maintenance of village access roads, construction of concrete and timber-decked bridges, culverts, drifts and splashes. These are aimed at improving communities’ access and use of public social economic amenities like schools, hospitals and markets.
As of June 2001, the PWP component had spent 14 million US dollars in its 798 projects scattered throughout the country’s 27 districts. This amount represents 20 percent of the total cost of projects MASAF has funded between July 1995 and June 2001. MASAF‘s latest progress report indicates that by June 2001, the project had constructed 652 rural earth roads, covering 7,000 kilometres.
Rural feeder roads needed
But most Malawians living in rural areas say one of the most serious problems they face, is the inadequate provision and maintenance of rural infrastructure like rural feeder roads, paths, tracks and small bridges, and means of transport facilities like hand and animal-drawn carts, bicycles, motorcycles and wheelbarrows to facilitate access to economical and social services and movement of agricultural produce to markets.
With an urbanisation rate of 13 percent, the majority of Malawians live in rural areas, and they depend on subsistence farming for their livelihood. According to the World Bank, 60 percent of the population live below the poverty line. Malawi is currently in the process of drafting a Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) that will enable her to benefit from debt relief, covering 43 percent of its 2.5 billion dollars in external debt, under the Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative.
Under the HIPC scheme, the WB and International Monetary Fund (IMF) require that savings from the scheme go towards poverty reduction programmes, to ensure that economic growth benefits the poor.
During PRSP consultations conducted in all the country’s districts in February 2001, most people stressed the need for good roads in rural areas. And they said, poverty could be reduced in their districts if the main rural roads could be made into all-weather roads.
A draft report on the district consultations prepared by the PRSP‘s technical committee, says improved transportation infrastructure would translate increased agricultural productivity into poverty reduction and open up rural areas to other off-farm diversifications such as tourism and agro-processing. According to the National Statistical Office (NSO), until 1998, Malawi had a total road network of 16,000 kilometres, of which 72 percent were earth roads. Bitumen accounted for 18 percent while 10 percent were gravel.
Projects
In 1996, Malawi’s government and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) launched a 1.4 million dollar Rural Motorised Transport (RMT) project, under which 36 mini-buses were bought and loaned out to operators based in 17 designated rural centres.
But the project, aimed at establishing whether rural transport could be a viable commercial venture, has faced a number of problems that have threatened its success. «Many operators failed to operate in the designated areas because of the poor rural roads,» says the Director of Transport and Planning in the Ministry of Transport and Public Works, Tomics Kaunda.
The operators also say they could not generate enough income from the rural areas, to enable them to repay their loans, resulting in the confiscation of some mini-buses, while others have broken down.
The Malawi Rural Travel and Transport Programme (MRTTP) is a joint initiative of the Malawi government and the Sub-Saharan African Transport Programme (SSATP) launched by the United Nations Economic Commission (UNECA) and the WB. The MRTTP aims at improving rural travel and transport services through the adoption of appropriate technology. This is intended to facilitate the movement of people and goods and improve the planning, financing, provision, and maintenance of travel and transport infrastructure. The programme encourages rural communities to use wheelbarrows, animal and hand-drawn carts, bicycles and other non-motorised facilities for their transport requirements.
«Malawi, like many African countries, has, in the past, concentrated on the development of conventional motorised means of transport. This in turn has contributed to the underdevelopment of low cost means of transport which can be used to provide affordable rural transport services,» says a newsletter published by the MRTTP. The newsletter goes on to say that if means of transport had been made readily available, growth in output and income would have been stimulated and poverty reduced. The transport system has not adequately responded to the needs of rural people, resulting in their continued isolation and the perpetuation of poverty.
ENGLISH CONTENTS | ANB-BIA HOMEPAGE | WEEKLY NEWS
PeaceLink 2002 - Reproduction authorised, with usual acknowledgement