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The massive growth of the mining and agriculture sectors has put pressure on the country’s transport infrastructure hence calls for the acceleration of the refurbishment and rehabilitation of the National Railways of Zimbabwe (NRZ)’s rail network.

The country can no longer continue to rely on road transport to move bulk cargo as this is not only expensive but also damages the country’s roads. The expanding industry and the mining sector now require a robust and efficient railway transport system to move raw materials and finished products.

The NRZ has said it needs about US$400 million to fully recapitalise operations in the short term and about US $1,9 billion in the long term. In 2017 NRZ signed a US$420 million recapitalisation deal with the Diaspora Infrastructure Development Group (DIDG) and Transnet of South Africa.

The deal was however cancelled by Cabinet in 2019 after the investors failed to provide proof of funding. The move by Cabinet came as a great shock to industrialists and other stakeholders who had pinned their hopes on the revival of the NRZ to address their transport challenges.

The DIDG-Transnet failed to meet contractual timelines two years after winning the tender. After the expiry of the deadline to provide proof of funding, Government gave the consortium a six-month grace period which again lapsed leaving Government with no option but to cancel the deal.

Instead of waiting for investors to come on board, the NRZ is using its limited resources to fund refurbishment of equipment such as locomotives and wagons as well as rehabilitating the railway infrastructure.

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What is encouraging is that last week Government announced that it had secured a US$115 million line of credit for NRZ to buy new locomotives and wagons in order to boost its capacity to meet industry’s transport demands.

Last month Government signed a US$81,2 million deal with India again meant to fund the recapitalisation of the NRZ. A positive development at

NRZ is that it has cleared its salary backlog and is now meeting its operating expenses which means any funding that comes along will be directed to its recapitalisation programme.

The recapitalisation and rehabilitation of the rail infrastructure should now be accelerated to enable the NRZ to regain its past status of being the transporter of choice for both industry and the mining sector.

Companies and mines are paying prohibitive transport costs for raw materials and finished products because they are using road transport instead of railway.

Rail is the cheapest and most efficient mode of transport hence the urgent need to revive NRZ to enable it to move the bulk of industry’s raw materials and finished products within the country or across the borders.