SADC’S INFRASTRUCTURE: A REGIONAL PERSPECTIVE The competitiveness of each corridor can be gauged by aggregating the time and costs associated with transport, administrative processes (customs), and long waits incurred along the route, whether at ports or otherwise. The cost of moving imports along each of these key arteries and the time taken for this movement are key elements of the competitiveness of both international and intraregional trade. The time taken can be broken down into four components: the travel time of goods, based on velocity along each corridor; the administrative time required to import goods into a country; the time taken to clear ports; and the delay incurred in crossing borders. Transport costs are based on the unit costs of moving freight along specific corridors and administrative costs are based on charges levied for bringing imports into a country. Port delays and border delays are quantified using the assumption that delays cost $5 per day per ton of imports.

Comparing the prices of road and rail freight that run parallel to each other in the SADC region suggests that railways have a slight competitive edge in terms of price per tonne-km. The north-south corridor has a competing railway system in southern Africa composed of several national railway systems that form a network (see box 2.1). Road freight tariffs along the north-south corridor are, on average, $0.05 per tonne-km (one of the lowest in Africa) due to widespread direct contracting between shippers and transporters. Overall prices vary along the corridor depending on the average traffic volumes of different segments. Meanwhile, rail tariffs are around $0.05 per tonne-km or even lower (figure 2.2). The only notable exception is the SNCC (in the Democratic Republic of Congo), whose average tariff is three times as much as that of roads ($0.15 per tonne-km), primarily because the state of the road system in the southern Democratic Republic of Congo is so poor that intermodal competition is rare. Assuming that there are no additional delays due to disrepair or other service disruptions, railways have a competitive edge in terms of average tariffs.

A comparison of the time required to move a given volume of imports from port of entry to destination revealed that road freight moving over the interregional corridors was faster than rail freight. The trains in southern Africa have rather low implicit velocities. Additionally, delays occur when cargo must be transferred from one national railway network to

**Figure 2.2 Comparison of road and rail freight tariffs**

<!-- Start of picture text --> 0.15<br>0.12<br>0.09<br>0.06<br>0.03<br>0.00<br>Road Spoornet TAZARA CCFB RSZ NRZ SNCC<br>US$ per ton-kilometer<br><!-- End of picture text --> _Source:_ AICD railway database **;** Teravaninthorn and Raballand 2009.

the other. (The average dwell time for imports at the frontier between two national rail networks is about three days.) On average, it takes between 400 hours (16 days) and 690 hours (28 days) to move freight along the southern African road network. By rail it takes 490 hours (20 days) to 1,200 hours (50 days) (figure 2.3). The slowest times recorded are for moving rail freight from Durban to Lubumbashi (in the Democratic Republic of Congo), with much of the delay occurring on the border between Zambia and the 14