SOUTH SUDAN’S INFRASTRUCTURE: A CONTINENTAL PERSPECTIVE Moving along corridors within South Sudan and between South Sudan and Sudan often requires the use of multimodal transport, further increasing transit times. Multimodal transport is the only option during half the year, when roads are unavailable during the rainy season. River transport services are underdeveloped, ports are underdeveloped, and commercial vessels are old. The services are limited between Juba and Kosti, mainly transporting goods delivered by train from Port Sudan to Kosti, about 1,400 km away from Juba. Freight that has to move via river takes six days longer than if it were to travel only by road (table 3).

Since South Sudan is landlocked, it depends on its neighbors to access coastal gateways. One option is accessing Port Sudan via Khartoum in Sudan. But the harsh intervening terrain makes this a difficult option. Further, compared to regional benchmarks, container dwell time at Port Sudan is over four times that of global best practices, truck cycle time for the receipt and delivery of cargo is 24 times higher than global benchmarks, and crane productivity is less than a third of

**Table 3. Time and costs associated with transport within all parts of Sudan**

|Route|Mode of<br>transport|Time (days)|Cost per tonne-<br>km (US$)|
|---|---|---|---|
|Khartoum–Malakal|Road and river|7|75|
||Road|5|107|
|Khartoum–Juba|Road and river|13.5|127|
||Road|7.5||
|Malakal–Juba|River|2|270|
|_Source:_AICD calculatio<br>FAO (2005); and Keer-|ns based on data from<br>MISC ( http://www.keer|Yoshino and others<br> -misc.com)|(2009); UNJLC and|

what is observed in other parts of Africa. Another coastal gateway available is Mombasa, Kenya, through Uganda. Cultural and geographic considerations aside, trading via Mombasa is the most economically viable option for South Sudan.

South Sudan might also rely on Lamu, Kenya, which is north of Mombasa, as a gateway to ship oil to overseas destinations in the future. An important consideration for South Sudan is the significant port congestion problems that currently plague both Port Sudan and Mombasa. As they significantly exceed their handling thresholds, both ports are facing extended dwell times and delays (though such challenges are more acute in Port Sudan than in Mombasa). As South Sudan becomes better integrated with East Africa, it is recommended that it rely more on Lamu and Mombasa, particularly considering the inefficiencies to be encountered at Port Sudan.

# **High costs**

Freight tariffs in South Sudan are as high as $0.20 per tonne-kilometer (tonne-km)—twice those found in Sudan and four times those in South Africa, the continent’s best performer (table 2). These costs are a direct economic consequence of South Sudan’s poor surface transport infrastructure and place a significant cost burden on transport users and suppliers. The average transport tariff between Juba and Kampala is $0.18 per tonne-km, or three times the average tariff paid to transport goods from Mombasa to Kampala (approximately $0.06 per tonne-km). Consequently, the overall cost of transporting goods over 980 km between Mombasa and Kampala is $115, and barely covers half the cost of transporting goods between Juba and Kampala, a distance of 630 km (Yoshino 2010).

Poor transport infrastructure forces trucks to carry small loads and face much longer travel times. Small loads automatically increase the average unit cost of transportation. For instance, limitations along 11