Tanzania has a total road network of approximately 85,000 km (including feeder, district and urban roads) of which about 5% is paved. Up until 1970's the economy of the country performed well with both agriculture (3.3% p.a) and industry growing at moderate rates. Road Maintenance was well managed and resources were adequate. In 1968 for instance, funds were allocated for road maintenance at the rate of US$ 800 per km for bitumen roads. For Engineered gravel and earth roads, the allocations were US$ 400 per km and US$ 230 per km respectively. By early 1980's the gap between public expenditure and aggregate supply widened, the current account deficit was about 15% of GDP, inflation was about 30% and the exchange rate was substantially overvalued. With these difficulties, the level of public expenditure allocated for maintenance declined such that by 1990, only about 15% trunk and 10% of the rural roads respectively were in good condition. Since 1998 the Tanzanian Road Sector has been undergoing far-reaching reforms whereby the Parliament enacted the Amendment for the purposes of making better provisions of the Act to establish a Roads Fund and the Government under the Executive Agencies Act, 1997 established an Executive Agency ( TANROADS), with the responsibility of management of the roads and ferries in Mainland Tanzania. The relevant particular of the Tanzanian experience is that the Road Fund Board also acts in the capacity as a Ministerial Advisory Board as provided for under the Executive Act, 1997. The Tanzanian experience has demonstrated that the above institutional arrangement did enhance TANROADS performance although it is slightly different from the two-board option as suggested by the SADC Model. Experience so far gained indicate that the envisaged reforms will help alleviate to a great extent the institutional problems of inadequate funding for road maintenance; cumbersome administrative and procurement procedures; unmotivated staff etc;. This paper also highlights operational constraints, recommendations/lessons and challenges for the future. For the covering abstract see ITRD E135448.
Samenvatting