Vehicle Load Compliance over 90 per cent due to SGR Cargo Train Transporting Heavy Containers
In the first quarter of the year 2018, Vehicle Load Compliance along the Northern Corridor Weighbridges and High Speed Weigh-in-Motion Weighbridges was over 90% and Mariakani was registering the highest level of compliance of over 99 per cent.
This was revealed by Prof. Paul M. Maringa, Principal Secretary, State Department of Transport, Ministry of Transport, Infrastructure, Housing and Urban Development in Kenya and Vice chairman of the Northern Corridor Executive Committee during his official opening of the joint Northern Corridor Specialised Technical Committees, held in Mombasa, Kenya, from 28th-31st May 2018.
“Between 2013 and 2017”, the Principal Secretary recalled, “several initiatives have been undertaken by the Member States and Private Sector players towards the improvement of trade and transport facilitation along the Northern Corridor such as the Development and maintenance of the Northern Corridor Road and Railway Networks; in particular implementation of the Standard Gauge Railway (SGR); completion and operationalization of 10 out of 15 One Stop Border Posts (OSBPs) across the region, Installation of High Speed Weigh-in-Motion weighbridges along the Northern Corridor and harmonization of Vehicle Load Controls.”
The highest level of Vehicle Load Compliance along the Northern Corridor Road Network was partly due to implementation of the SGR which was transporting a big proportion of the heavy containers.
Prof. Paul Maringa, commended the implementation of Soft infrastructure such as the Regional Cargo Tracking System (R-ECTS), Regional Customs Transit Bond Guarantee (RCTG), EAC Single Customs Territory (SCT) and National Electronic Single Window Systems (e-SWS) which has eased the clearance of cargo at the port and border stations registering a border crossing time on average of less than 3 hours for goods cleared under SCT.
He also mentioned several improvements undertaken at the Port of Mombasa such as dredging of the Port, construction of a new berth to allow docking of larger vessels (i.e. those which carry 6,000 containers), construction of a new container terminal which increased the Port Annual Capacity by 550,000 TEUs as well as the construction of the Dongo Kundu road to ease the flow of traffic to and from the Port.
“Thanks to those initiatives at the Port of Mombasa, the Northern Corridor region has witnessed annual cargo throughput rise from 20 to 30 million tons; the port cargo dwell time drop from 6 days to an average of 3 days; transit time from Mombasa to Malaba drop from 2 weeks to an average of 3 days; border crossing time drop from 5 days on average to a couple of hours, and weighbridge crossing time drop from days to an average of less than 20 minutes”, revealed PS Paul Maringa.
Fred TUMWEBAZE, the Ag. Executive Secretary of the Northern Corridor Transit and Transport Coordination Authority (NCTTCA), commended Member States and Development Partners for the achievements and initiatives happening in the Northern Corridor region.
“Northern Corridor Member States are always committed to building a strong partnership towards improving trade, reducing costs of doing business and enhancing the excellent cooperation, as enshrined in the Northern Corridor Transit and Transport Agreement”, recalled Fred TUMWEBAZE.
He requested Member States to support some key initiatives and programmes that are ongoing in the Corridor; namely, the rehabilitation and upgrading of roads, the development of One Stop Border Posts (OSBPs), the concept of Sustainable and Greener Corridor, the establishment of Roadside Stations along the Corridor, the Standard Gauge Railway, expansion of Port facilities and the development of regional Pipeline connectivity.