How Tanzanians see their new railway, and what we can learn

An efficient modern railway network is the supreme symbol of economic diplomacy and a well-paved pathway to prosperity and regional integration. That is why African nations are everywhere reviving and modernising their railway network. Tanzania is one of the African countries investing heavily in the railway as a road to shared prosperity nationally and regionally. On August 1, 2024, Tanzania’s sixth President Dr. Samia Suluhu Hassan, officially launched the country’s Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) Project in which it has invested nearly $10 billion. Kenya’s rulers and pundits won’t agree. They lampoon their SGR railway as a ‘road to nowhere’, literally and metaphorically, not to prosperity.

Yet, Tanzanians have embraced their modern railway as a sharp tool of economic diplomacy. They are investing in the modernisation and expansion of their railway network to achieve their national interests and reposition their country as the gateway to East and Central Africa. The result is the longest, most cost-effective, potentially profitable and modern SGR rail system on the African continent covering 2,102 kilometers. After Kenya’s proposed 1,300-kilometer SGR line from Mombasa to Malaba town on the border with Uganda was suddenly stalled at Duka Moja near Naivasha in 2019, the country has only 600 kilometers of SGR railway. This stretch is way below the 1000 kilometers global threshold for profitability.