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Ports authority targets Rwanda to up revenue

Dar es Salaam. Tanzania Ports Authority (TPA) has high expectation to increase efficiency in cargo handling and revenue generation at the Dar es Salaam Port following the launch of liaison office in Kigali in the first week of this month.

Speaking to The Citizen yesterday, the TPA communications manager, Ms Janeth Ruzangi, said that the biggest port is to increase efficiency at highest record soon after the launch of a liaison office in Kigali Rwanda.

“Efficiency at the Dar es Salaam port will increase further and more cargo from and to Rwanda will pass at the Dar es Salaam port as cumbersome procedures and graft at the Dar es Salaam port will seize,” said Ms Ruzangi.

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According to her, Rwanda which ranks the third after Zambia and DR Congo in terms of the number of cargo passing at the biggest port will increase cargo imports and exports because of reduced cost of doing business.

After opening of TPA liaison office Rwandan importers and exporters are no longer compelled to travel to Dar es Salaam port, Tanzania to clear their shipments. Rwandan traders have been quoted as saying, the initiative by TPA will reduce the cost of doing business along the central corridor.

One of them, Mr Fred Seka, the head of the Rwanda Association of Clearing and Freight Forwarders, said the new office will enhance efficiency and competitiveness.

Tanzania’s port of Dar es Salaam is by far the most important port for Rwanda, accounting for over 80 per cent of the Rwandan international maritime trade, according to Mr Seka.

More than 90 per cent of other exports (apart from tea and coffee) go through Dar es Salaam, according to figures from Rwandan Ministry of Trade and Industry.

Jean de Dieu Uwihanganye Rwanda’s state minister in charge of transport, said at the event that serving traders from Kigali could help reduce the time it takes to move cargo between the two countries by almost 50 per cent.

Currently, it takes almost five days to transport cargo from Dar port to Kigali, but with the new TPA office in Kigali, this could be reduced, thus increasing trade volumes in the long run, minister Uwihanganye said


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