Why Bangula-Marka railway line is critical to economy

When the 72-kilometre Marka-Bangula Railway Project started in May 2022, Chipiliro Jango, who is village head Mwatani of Traditional Authority Ndamera in Nsanje District, was hopeful.

To the chief, the rail would herald a new lease of life, bringing numerous business opportunities to people who are mostly involved in charcoal burning business.

The rail construction, however, is still underway as several factors such as change of the contractor in 2021, cyclones and kwacha devaluation delayed the project, which twice missed deadlines in November 2023 and April 2024.

Luckily, Jango, village head Ganunga and dozens of people are still contracted to the project, a move that ensures circulation of money at community level to support small and medium enterprises as the wait continues for the project to be completed.

Says Jango: “As of now, we are still working with the contractor because there is still one bridge that is under construction between Marka Border and Nsanje Boma to connect Bangula and Marka.

“However, we are optimistic because from early this year, cargo trains are delivering construction materials for the contractor from Mozambique to Marka, which gives us hope that the remaining stretch will be completed.”

On his part, village head Ganunga says his subjects have been benefiting from the project through job opportunities, which are trickling down as most households surrounding the railway have secured jobs.

Ganunga, however, stresses the need for quick completion of the project, which will discourage charcoal burning activities.

“It is our hope that the project will finally be completed this year because apart from unlocking business opportunities from the delivered cargo, we will also be able to transport our agricultural produce to the markets be it in Mozambique or other parts of the country.

“Currently, it is expensive to ferry agricultural produce to Limbe in Blantyre because transport costs are high; hence, most farmers do not have access to markets,” says Ganunga.

In an interview, Nsanje Central legislator Kafandikhale Mandevana believes the only way to unlock Nsanje’s economic potential is to complete the Bangula-Marka Rail Project, which will open the flow of cargo from Beira Port in Mozambique to Malawi, which could only take 10 hours.

“The Bangula-Marka Railway Project is the shortest route for Malawi that links Beira Port in Mozambique and such a connection will guarantee easy haulage of commodities such as fuel and other imports and exports,” he says.

Connecting the country’s shortest route to Beira Port through rail is, apart from boosting trade and economic activity in the border district, expected to reduce costs of imports and exports by almost half.

This aspiration to a landlocked Malawi, is more than a relief as the cost of transport and other logistics faced by landlocked countries in sub-Saharan Africa translate to a competitive disadvantage.

In its recent report titled Harnessing Natural Resources for Economic Transformation, the World Bank said transportation and logistics costs in sub-Saharan African countries are high compared with other developing nations, thereby undermining intra-regional trade and economic transformation.

Reads the report in part: “The cost of shipping a container from China to Beira in Mozambique is $2 000 [about K2.5 million], but transporting that same container from Beira to Malawi, a distance of 500 kilometres inland costs $5 000 [about K8.7 million].”

“The development linked to a range of factors, including poorly developed and under maintained physical infrastructure, lack of regional and international transport connectivity, inefficient logistics services and poor access to shipping services makes the country uncompetitive.”

Minister of Transport Jacob Hara said the government is in the process of resolving challenges that have been affecting the initiative while stressing that the project will be completed by December this year by the same contractor, China Railway 20 Bureau Group (CR20).

He says: “The main problem on the rail has been changes in the flooded line. What happened was that we had initial designs on this rail which seemingly were good to go.

“When our engineers reviewed the designs and the type of strength that we needed on this rail, it transpired that those designs were not good enough. We needed to bring our rail slightly higher to prevent the issues experienced on the main road.”

But Hara expressed optimism that the issues will be resolved soon; hence, gave an assurance that the railway project will stretch to Nsanje by the end of this year.

Secretary to the President and Cabinet Colleen Zamba, who recently inspected the project, said revamping rail remains the government’s top priority and was optimistic that the project will be completed this year.

Speaking when the National Oil Company of Malawi brought fuel through wagons from Nacala Port to Lilongwe after 21 years, she said government plans to extend the rail project to the northern region to reduce further transportation costs.

“Government plans to extend the rail-line to Northern regions to fully connect all the country’s trade routes and we are hopeful of cutting transportation costs by almost 60 percent on fuel and other products,” she said.

A recent United Nations report showed that the country’s transport sector accounts for 56 percent of landed costs and 30 percent of export costs, thereby increasing the cost of imported goods and hurting Malawi’s regional trade competitiveness.

The report further said transport accounts for 43 percent of its commercial energy consumption as more than 70 percent of internal freight traffic and 99 percent of passenger traffic is handled by road transport.

In 2020, President Lazarus Chakwera and his Mozambican counterpart Felipe Nyusi agreed to revive the railway line between the two countries, which is one of Malawi’s shortest routes to the Port of Beira.

Mozambique already completed its 44 kilometre section from Mutarara to Marka.