THE CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC’S INFRASTRUCTURE: A CONTINENTAL PERSPECTIVE

**Table 2. Trading across borders in Central African countries**

|Country|Documents to<br>export<br>(number)|Time to export<br>(days)|Cost to export<br>($ per<br>container)|Documents to<br>import<br>(number)|Time to import<br>(days)|Cost to import<br>($ per container)|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|Burundi|9|47|2,747|10|71|4,285|
|Cameroon|11|23|1,379|12|26|1,978|
|**Central African Republic**|**9**|**54**|**5,491**|**17**|**62**|**5,554**|
|Chad|6|75|5,902|10|101|8,150|
|Congo, Dem. Rep. of|8|44|3,505|9|63|3,735|
|Congo, Rep. of|11|50|3,818|10|62|7,709|
|Equatorial Guinea|7|29|1,411|7|48|1,411|
|Gabon|7|20|1,945|8|22|1,955|
|Rwanda|8|35|3,275|8|34|4,990|
|São Tomé and Principe|8|27|690|8|29|577|
|Central Africa|8|40|3,016|10|52|4,034|
|Sub-Saharan Africa|8|32|1,962|9|38|2,492|

_Source:_ World Bank 2010g. _Note:_ Documents to export (import): The total number of documents required per shipment to export (import) goods. Documents required for clearance by government ministries, customs authorities, port and container terminal authorities, health and technical control agencies, and banks are taken into account. Time to export (import): The time necessary to comply with all procedures required to export (import) goods. If a procedure can be accelerated for an additional cost, the fastest legal procedure is chosen. Cost to export (import): The cost associated with all procedures required to export (import) goods. Includes the costs for documents, administrative fees for customs clearance and technical control, customs broker fees, terminal-handling charges, and inland transport.

Expensive surface transport costs along the Bangui-Douala corridor account for the bulk of the cost of importing to the CAR (figure 5a). Inland transport costs, at about $3,500 to $4,500 per container, account for more than 65 percent of the total cost of importing (see table 2). Moving a tonne of freight along intraregional corridors in the Central African region<sup>2</sup> costs twice as much (between $230 and $650) as in southern Africa region<sup>3</sup> (between $120 and $270), where distances are significantly longer (World Bank 2010a).

Surface transport costs are highly impacted by the strong presence of freight bureaus and transport associations, which prevent truck operators from contracting with customers directly and result in high profit margins for the trucking industry. The regulatory framework, based on market sharing and centralized allocation of freight, limits vehicle mileage (to around 2,000 km per month versus 12,000 in the developed world) and weakens incentives to invest in service quality upgrades. As a result, the truck fleet is largely composed of poorly maintained secondhand trucks that are typically overloaded to obtain maximum revenue from their restricted usage. This is a rather serious problem in the region and promotes excess supply, with too many vehicles chasing modest freight volumes.

2 Comprising Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Equatorial Guinea, and Gabon.

3 Comprising Angola, Botswana, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

10