The Ghana Railways Development Authority (GRDA) is set to roll out a six-phase master plan that will see the systematic upgrading of old infrastructure and installation of new facilities to haul it back from the brink of the abyss.
The construction of standard gauge lines covering a total of 4007.6 km of railways nationwide, the building of inland ports, and the development of a cross-border network that is expected to attract transit trade from Ghana’s neighbours, were all integral to the master plan, GRDA CEO Richard Dombo told delegates at the Africa Rail expo in Sandton last week.
“The rail network is intended to make Ghana the rail transport hub of West Africa,” said Dombo, adding that as a result of a lack of maintenance and investment, the current rail network was “virtually non-existent”. “Last year literally every single line in Ghana had ground to a halt.” But something in the Ghanaian spirit inspired the West African country to turn its fortunes around.
“We identified a while ago that in order to drive our economy we would have to become a dominant trade player,” said Christian Saporga, envoy for Ghana’s Ministry of Transport. The country’s maritime system is already well on its way to becoming a juggernaut in the Gulf of Guinea, with the port of Tema fast shrinking the slight lead in capacity that a port like Abidjan in
Ivory Coast holds over it. But as pointed out by Dr Andrew Shaw, director of Transport and Logistics at PwC, having a strong port isn’t enough. You need everything else to back it up – solid back-ofport systems, and effective hinterland networks. Otherwise a burgeoning hub-port such as Tema, where development is under way to handle two million extra twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs), could run into capacity issues.
“That’s why we came up with a comprehensive approach,” Saporga said, “working towards establishing a railway sector that will enable us to become a primary bulk transit goods country for northern neighbours such as Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso.” But it will take some time before Ghana’s rail system is out of the woods.
Said Dombo: “Infrastructure is the foundation of national development but is intrinsically linked to the inescapable fact of exorbitant cost. “To effectively tackle this element it’s imperative to have a phased masterplan that involves parastatal and private development partners.”
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We identified a while ago that in order to drive our economy we would have to become a dominant trade player. – Christian Saporga
