Abstract
In general, the position of the railways in developing countries is not very good: the railways have lost customers to other modes of transport thus encountering heavy losses. The government has great difficulties in meeting these financial losses, there is a lack of middle-management. When governments are interested in the railways, they often want to modernize them radically like those in the industrial countries, while updating the existing system and changing the people's mentality in favour of this would do the railways much more good.