West African Countries Set Date For Work On Key Rail Line

West African countries set date for work on key rail line

OUAGADOUGOU, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 19th Jul, 2017 ) - Work to rehabilitate a 1,260-kilometre (782-mile) railway that is a vital link between the Sahel and Atlantic coast will begin on September 15, the governments of Burkina Faso and Ivory Coast said Tuesday.

The two governments, along with the track's operating company Sitarail, signed an agreement setting the date at a meeting in the Burkinabe capital. Under a deal reached with Sitarail's parent company, the French group Bollore, 400 million Euros ($462 million) will be committed to modernising the route, Burkina Faso's Foreign Minister Alpha Barry said.

The first phase, costing 130 million euros, will last four years, Barry said, without giving a completion date for the overall project. "The work will start on September 15, there will also be orders for new material, new locomotives," said Eric Melet, chief executive for development at Bollore Transport and Logistics.

"It will go ahead very quickly." The unelectrified single-line track traces its origins back to the late 19th century, when France was looking for ways to link the colonised Sahel to its trading posts on the Atlantic.