Mozambique’s minister of transport has told listeners to Radio Mozambique that the Malawi’s government’s intention to use the Zambezi and Chinde rivers for commercial shipping had been rejected.
This followed a meeting last Wednesday in Lilongwe, where representatives from Mozambique, Malawi and Zambia met to look at the results of a study commissioned from independent consultants on the navigability of those two rivers.
The minister said that Malawi’s deepest river, the Shire, and Mozambique’s Zambezi River into which it flows, are not commercially navigable, and needed a dredging programme valued at the equivalent of more than R250 million to deepen them by 1.5 metres. Add to that R417m annually for further dredging and maintenance and R695m to clear the rivers and banks of vegetation, plus other costs for investments in port and operating infrastructure.
All that, said the minister, for only 250 000 tonnes of cargo annually.
The consultants also pointed out that the rivers are only navigable for about four to five months a year, reported the daily newspaper Notícias.
Note: North of the main delta, the Chinde River separates from the Zambezi’s main stream to form a navigable channel leading to a shallow harbour.
Sources: Radio Mozambique, Noticias, macauhub.com and Encyclopaedia Britannica
