Long-distance truckers operating on the Nairobi- Mombasa highway
are bracing for tough times ahead as Kenya Railways Corporation (KRC)
prepares to launch cargo operations on its Standard Gauge Railway (SGR)
line next month.
According to Kenya Railways managing
director Atanas Maina, commercial trials have been ongoing since Friday
to test logistics in preparation for full operations starting January.
“The
freight activities currently taking place is a trial phase in
preparation for full commercial activity that will begin in January,”
said Mr Maina.
“It is basically meant to test the
systems in place and ensure everything is in good working order,
identify any gaps in preparation for the exercise.”
Road
transporters on the busy corridor have been charging an average of
Sh80,000 per twenty foot equivalent units (TEU) container from the
coastal city to Nairobi’s Nairobi Inland Container Depot (ICD).
KRC will, however, charge $500 (Sh50,000) to transport the same size of container between the cities.
Traders
will, however, have to foot the additional cost of moving the
containers from the inland depot to their premises, meaning that some
could still find it cheaper to use trucks depending on distance from the
railway terminal.
Shippers moving cargo from Nairobi
ICD to Mombasa terminal will also pay half of what importers part with
to move items in the reverse direction.
For instance,
it will cost Sh275 per tonne of agricultural input, Sh330 per tonne of
light bulky goods and Sh660 per tonne of a vehicle, from Nairobi to
Mombasa within a distance of 200 kilometeres.
In the
opposite direction (Mombasa-Nairobi), the SGR freight service will
charge Sh550 per tonne of agricultural inputs, Sh1,430 per tonne of
light cargo and Sh1,320 per tonne of vehicles within the same distance.
Cargo
trains will charge Sh1,100 per tonne of agricultural inputs, Sh2,860
per tonne of light bulky goods and Sh2,640 per tonne of vehicles within a
distance of between 350 and 400 kilometres from the port of Mombasa to
Nairobi. The opposite direction will attract a 50 per cent discount for
each category.
“I can’t think it will be business as
usual because as it stands, we are not sure of our role as road freight
transporters,” said Rongai Workshop and Transport Limited managing
director Vanessa Evans.
Ms Evans, who oversees her
family business’ 105 trucks says that long distance transporter may have
to venture into other businesses to survive.
“We are
not really sure of how it’s going to work. It’s important that we get
clarification bearing in mind they are going to take a huge chunk of
cargo business along the Mombasa-Nairobi route,” she said.
SGR trains have a capacity to clear cargo population at a rate of 1,000 containers per day carrying an average of 88 (TEU).
According
to KRC, the country has so far received 25 freight locomotives out of
the 43 on order. It has also received 763 wagons out of the 1,620 units
it expects.
The 25-tonne axle flat wagons can each
carry a payload of 70 tonnes, implying 1143,400 tonnes can be hauled in
all of them and deployed on a single trip to Nairobi.
The
trains are designed to move at a speed of 80 km per hour, compared to
the existing metre gauge rail trains, which on average do about half
that speed.
The launch of the cargo service will bring
the railway to full operation, with the line having been transporting
passengers since June.
The second phase of construction
of the SGR running 120 kilometres to Naivasha is set to begin in
earnest in the new year, with the railway expected to reach Kisumu by
2022.
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