ECOWAS‘S INFRASTRUCTURE: A REGIONAL PERSPECTIVE

|||**Co**<br>|**ndition**<br>|||**Type**<br>||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
||Good|Fair|Poor|Unknown|Paved|Unpaved|Unknown|
|Senegal|39.8|15.1|45.1|0.0|99.8|0.2|0.0|
|Sierra Leone|19.5|58.4|22.1|0.0|33.6|66.4|0.0|
|Togo|49.7|0.0|50.3|0.0|100.0|0.0|0.0|
|ECOWAS|45.1|28.4|22.5|4.0|92.5|7.4|0.1|

Source: AICD various sources

# Railways

Unlike the situation in southern Africa, there is no real regional rail network in the ECOWAS area, nor are the rail gauges internally compatible. In fact, the national rail networks of ECOWAS‘s member states are mostly disconnected from each other. This is in contrast to southern Africa, where interconnected national railway systems form a regional railway network that spans half a dozen countries and extends from the southern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo all the way to Durban in South Africa. Further integration of West Africa‘s rail systems is complicated by the presence of multiple rail gauges. Ghana and Nigeria have the Cape gauge (1,067 millimeters in width). Most of the francophone countries (Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d‘Ivoire, Mali, Senegal, and Togo) operate the meter gauge (1,000 millimeters in width). Guinea and Liberia use the standard gauge (1,435 millimeters in width).

The case for further regional integration of railway networks is constrained by the relatively limited usage of existing lines. Rail traffic density in West Africa is only a fraction of that found in southern Africa and North Africa (figure 2.7). With the exception of Ghana Railways Corporation (GRC), most of West African railways are serving well under one million traffic units per year. (The Nigeria Railways Corporation could potentially serve a much higher volume of traffic than it does today, but it has suffered long-term decline due to neglect and substandard performance.) By global standards, these levels of traffic are little more than what might be carried by a moderately busy branch line. Moreover, such low traffic volumes do not generate the revenue needed to finance track rehabilitation and upgrading. Under these market conditions, and given the technical incompatibilities, the case for further integration of railway networks is quite limited.

Before contemplating further extensions to the rail network, a turnaround in the performance of existing railways is sorely needed to regain competitiveness with road transport. The poor quality of service provided by West Africa‘s railways makes it increasingly difficult for them to compete with road transportation. Most railways in West Africa operate at the standard at which they were originally built and now face major problems with competing modes of transport. West African tracks can accommodate relatively lightweight and slow-moving trains. Poor maintenance over extended periods of time has caused the deterioration of many sections of the track beyond repair and resulted in a loss of competitiveness and rolling-stock productivity. While such inefficiencies can be tolerated on low-volume feeder lines and may be the only way some can be viably operated, they are a major handicap when competing against the modern roads being built in major corridors.

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