Trade corridors bring sea closer

Trade corridors are helping open up Africa’s 15 land-locked countries to international trade. They are Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Chad, Central African Republic, Ethiopia, Lesotho, Malawi, Mali, the Niger, Rwanda, Swaziland, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Together they make up half of the world’s 30 land-locked developing countries. Their economic development is being stif led by the lack of access to ports. It is estimated that, on average, transport costs in these countries can be as high as 77% of the value of exports. Additional border crossings and long distances from their markets substantially increase the cost of transport. Another challenge is that most land-locked African countries have to rely on neighbours which are themselves developing countries, with weak transport infrastructure. Poor neighbours also make for poor markets, and intra-African trade levels remain low. In comparison, landlocked European countries are surrounded by economically developed markets. As a result, the majority of their exports do not have to travel by sea, or they have relatively less costly access to ports. Having recognised the challenges a number of governments across Africa are working on establishing trade corridors. They are being assisted by a number of international agencies which are providing funds and expertise. As can be seen with the rollout of the Maputo and Walvis Bay corridors, it takes much more than infrastructure investment to make a corridor work. Often it is delays at the borders which do more to add costs and reduce efficiency than anything else. The seemingly simple solution of establishing one-stop border posts is itself fraught with difficulties due to turf wars between the customs authorities on either side of the border and the incompatibility of customs systems. Effective marketing of the corridors is equally important. Forwarders and shippers seem to stick with what they know works – until there are major hiccups due to strikes or natural disasters or cost pressures encourage them to look elsewhere. Source: TradeMark Southern Africa. CAPTION Major transport corridors of southern Africa.