There are a number of systems of transport in Burundi, including road and water-based infrastructure, the latter of which makes use of Lake Tanganyika. Furthermore, there are also some airports in Burundi.
Burundi has limited ferry services on Lake Tanganyika, few road connections to neighboring countries, no rail connections, and only one airport with a paved runway. Public transport is extremely limited and private bus companies operate buses on the route to Kigali, Uganda, Tanzania and Democratic Republic of Congo. [1]
Roads total 12,322 kilometres (7,657 mi) as of 2004. On paper, there are 90 public buses in the country but few of these are operational. Transport is extremely limited, and private bus companies operate buses on the route to Kigali, Uganda, Tanzania or the Democratic Republic of Congo. [1]
Lake Tanganyika is used for transport, with the major port on the lake being the Port of Bujumbura. Most freight is transported down waterways. [2]
As of May 2015, MV Mwongozo, a passenger and cargo ferry, connects Bujumbura with Kigoma in Tanzania. [3]
Burundi possesses eight airports, of which one has paved runways, whose length exceeds 3,047m. Bujumbura International Airport is the country's primary airport and the country's only airport with a paved runway. There are also a number of helicopter landing strips. [4]
As of May 2015, the airlines serving Burundi are: Brussels Airlines, Ethiopian Airlines, flydubai, Kenya Airways, and RwandAir. Kigali is the city with the most daily departures.
Burundi does not possess any railway infrastructure, although there are proposals to connect Burundi to its neighbours via railway.
At a meeting in August 2006 with members of the Rwanda Patriotic Front, Wu Guanzheng, of the Chinese Communist Party, confirmed the intention of China to fund a study into the feasibility of constructing a railway connecting at Isaka with the existing Tanzanian railway network, and running via Kigali in Rwanda through to Burundi. [5] Tanzanian railways use 1,000 mm (3 ft 3+3⁄8 in) metre gauge , although TAZARA and other neighbouring countries, including the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) use the 3 ft 6 in (1,067 mm) gauge, leading to some potential difficulties.
Another project was launched in the same year, which aims to link Burundi and Rwanda (which also has no railways) to the DRC and Zambia, and therefore to the rest of Southern Africa. At a meeting to inaugurate the Northern Corridor Transit and Transport Coordination Authority (NCTTCA), the governments of Uganda and Burundi backed the proposed new railway from the Ugandan western railhead at Kasese into the DRC.
Additionally, Burundi has been added to a planned railway project to connect Tanzania and Rwanda. In January 2022, the governments of Burundi and Tanzania announced the planned construction of an electrified standard gauge railway, which will link the two countries. [6] The line is known as the Tanzania–Burundi Standard Gauge Railway.
A project started in November 2013 to build a Standard Gauge line from Mombassa, Kenya, to Burundi, via Rwanda and Uganda. [7] The main line from Mombasa will also feature branches in other directions, including Ethiopia and DR Congo.
Ground transport in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has always been difficult. The terrain and climate of the Congo Basin present serious barriers to road and rail construction, and the distances are enormous across this vast country. Furthermore, chronic economic mismanagement and internal conflict has led to serious under-investment over many years.
Transport in Kenya refers to the transportation structure in Kenya. The country has an extensive network of paved and unpaved roads.
The transport system in Rwanda centres primarily around the road network. Paved roads lie between the capital, Kigali, and most other major cities and towns in the country. Rwanda is also linked by road with other countries in the African Great Lakes, via which the majority of the country's imports and exports are made.
Transport in Tanzania includes road, rail, air and maritime networks. The road network is 86,472 kilometres (53,731 mi) long, of which 12,786 kilometres (7,945 mi) is classified as trunk road and 21,105 kilometres (13,114 mi) as regional road. The rail network consists of 3,682 kilometres (2,288 mi) of track. Commuter rail service is in Dar es Salaam only. There are 28 airports, with Julius Nyerere International being the largest and the busiest. Ferries connect Mainland Tanzania with the islands of Zanzibar. Several other ferries are active on the countries' rivers and lakes.
Transport in Uganda refers to the transportation structure in Uganda. The country has an extensive network of paved and unpaved roads.
The African Great Lakes are a series of lakes constituting the part of the Rift Valley lakes in and around the East African Rift. The series includes Lake Victoria, the second-largest freshwater lake in the world by area; Lake Tanganyika, the world's second-largest freshwater lake by volume and depth; Lake Malawi, the world's eighth-largest freshwater lake by area; and Lake Turkana, the world's largest permanent desert lake and the world's largest alkaline lake. Collectively, they contain 31,000 km3 (7,400 cu mi) of water, which is more than either Lake Baikal or the North American Great Lakes. This total constitutes about 25% of the planet's unfrozen surface fresh water. The large rift lakes of Africa are the ancient home of great biodiversity, and 10% of the world's fish species live in this region.
The Cape to Cairo Railway was an unfinished project to create a railway line crossing from southern to northern Africa. It would have been the largest, and most important, railway of the continent. It was planned as a link between Cape Town in South Africa and Port Said in Egypt.
Melchior Ndadaye International Airport is an airport in Bujumbura, the former capital of Burundi. It is Burundi's only international airport and the only one with a paved runway.
The Northern Corridor Transit and Transport Coordination Authority (NCTTCA) is an intergovernmental body, encompassing six countries in Eastern Africa, tasked with the job of coordinating transport infrastructure improvements.
Isaka is a small town and station on the narrow-gauge Mwanza railway line of Tanzania which connects to the seaport of Dar es Salaam.
The Lagos–Mombasa Highway or TAH 8 is Trans-African Highway 8 and is the principal road route between West and East Africa. It has a length of 6,259 km (3,889 mi) and is contiguous with the Dakar-Lagos Highway with which it will form the longest east-west crossing of the continent for a total distance of 10,269 km (6,381 mi). Its main importance at the moment is connecting West Africa with Southern Africa via Yaoundé and Gabon because the section through the Democratic Republic of the Congo is unpaved and difficult.
The East African Federation is a proposed federal sovereign state consisting of the eight member states of East African Community in the African Great Lakes region – Burundi, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, Rwanda, Somalia, South Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda. The idea of this federation has existed since the early 1960s but has not yet come to fruition for several reasons. In September 2018, a committee was formed to begin the process of drafting a regional constitution, and a draft constitution for the confederation was set to be written by the end of 2021 with its implementation by 2023. However, the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted plans to draft and implement a constitution. On 9 May 2023, the drafting of the constitution resumed with a 20-day consultation with local stakeholders in Kenya.The East African Federation has not yet been established, but many steps have been taken to advance this eventual goal. Institutions and governing bodies already exist for the eventual union of these nations, with representatives from all of the related nations working together towards this common goal.
There are several planned railway lines in Rwanda, including a line to Tanzania. Historical railways are limited to three industrial railways.
KCB Group Limited, also known as the KCB Group, is a financial services holding company based in the African Great Lakes region. The Group's headquarters are in Nairobi, Kenya, with its subsidiaries being KCB Bank Kenya Limited, KCB Bank Burundi Limited, KCB Bank Rwanda Limited, KCB Bank South Sudan Limited, KCB Bank Tanzania Limited, KCB TMB Congo and KCB Bank Uganda Limited.
The East African Railway Master Plan is a proposal for rejuvenating the railways serving Tanzania, Kenya, and Uganda, and building new railways to serve Rwanda and Burundi. The objective is to further the economic development of East Africa by increasing the efficiency and speed, and lowering the cost, of transporting cargo between major ports on the Indian Ocean coast and the interior.
Société Nationale des Transports Aériens du Rwanda, or Air Rwanda as the airline was commonly known was the national airline of Rwanda, with its base at Kigali International Airport in Kigali. The airline operated for 21 years. In 1996 the airline was rebranded and renamed to Rwanda Air which finally led to the formation of RwandAir in 2002.
The history of rail transport in Burundi is limited to a now closed industrial railway, and a number of proposed railway projects that, as of 2012, had not been implemented.
The Isaka–Kigali Standard Gauge Railway is a planned railway line linking the town of Isaka in Tanzania to the city of Kigali in Rwanda.
The Kenya Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) is a partially finished railway system connecting Kenya's cities. Once completed, it will link the country to the neighboring country of Uganda, and through Uganda, to South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, and Burundi. There are also plans to link to Addis Ababa, in neighboring Ethiopia to the north. The first segment, between Mombasa and Nairobi, opened passenger rail service in June 2017, and freight rail service in January 2018. Other segments are under construction or planned. The new standard gauge railway, is intended to replace the old, inefficient metre-gauge railway system.
The Rwanda Standard Gauge Railway is a standard gauge railway (SGR) system, under development, linking the country to the neighboring countries of Tanzania and Uganda. It is intended to ease the transfer of goods between the Indian Ocean ports of Dar es Salaam and Mombasa, and the Rwandan capital Kigali. The system is expected to link, in the future, to Rwanda's two other neighbors, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, as part of the East African Railway Master Plan. With no previously existing railway network, Rwanda is developing its railway system from scratch. The project is dependent on the construction of the Tanzanian and Ugandan SGR lines to the Rwandan border, which have not been completed as of October 2023.
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This article incorporates public domain material from The World Factbook. CIA.
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