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Issue 00435 |
September 9 - 15, 2006 |
issn 0856 - 9135 |
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Front Page 1 |
| Local communities to taste EAC’s first fruits by Edward Selasini Local communities, traders and the tourism industry will be among stakeholders who will benefit from the construction of the 240-kilometre Arusha-Namanga-Athi River road (Kenya) which is scheduled to start in April next year. The project is being undertaken under the auspices of East Africa Community with funding from the African Development Bank and Japan Bank for International Cooperation The first fruits of the project will be in terms of employment to communities living near the highway, and access to social services such as water and HIV-AIDS education. According to EAC Engineer, Hosea Nyangweso, early benefits to the communities include potable water as four boreholes will be drilled because almost the entire corridor where the road passes has no rivers. During the construction of the road various camps will be set up and a programme has been worked out to disseminate information on HIV/AIDS in the camps. Constriction of the road is expected to last 36 months and upon completion in April 2010 it will improve transport service and lower transport costs between Arusha and Nairobi across the boarder at Namanga. “The principal beneficiaries will be the tourism industry in both countries, cross boarder trading, regional socio-economic integration and poverty alleviation,” says a statement by Owora Richard Othieno, EAC’s Public Relations Officer. The Arusha-Namanga-Athi River trunk road is 104.4 km on the Tanzanian side and 135.7 km on the Kenyan side. Currently the whole road is bituminized but dilapidated especially the Tanzania stretch which has never been resurfaced since colonial times. The US$175.3 million dollar project is a multinational program which forms parts of what is termed as Corridor No.5 of the East African Community Regional Roads Network Programme which spans from Tunduma in southern Tanzania to Moyale in northern Kenya. Civil works for the project will involve contracts in two lots, one for the Kenyan side and another for the Tanzanian stretch of the road. Engineer Nyangweso told The Arusha Times that the average financial cost per kilometre of civil works in Kenya is US$631,000 while the average financial cost per kilometre of civil works in Tanzania is US$533,000. “The difference in cost is caused by the difference in pavement design whereby the Kenyan section exhibited higher traffic loading and thus required thicker pavement,” he noted. The geometric, however, are the same and the surfacing is the same consisting of 11 metres wide road finished with 50mm asphalt concrete and a single layer of bituminous surface dressing. The road will not only be smooth to motorists but will also be user friendly to pedestrians, cyclists and livestock. It will have safe side walk paths for pedestrians as well as underpasses in some areas for domestic animals. The African Development Bank and Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) will finance up to 90 per cent of the economic cost of the project. The government of Tanzania and Kenya will cover part of the economic costs in local currency.
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