The Role of the Transport Sector in Ethiopia's
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Economic Focus The Role of the Transport Sector in Ethiopia’s Economic Development L±n a^×Ñì@KS THE ROLE OF THE TRANSPORT SECTOR IN ETHIOPIA’S ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT * Temesgen Aklilu** Translated by Yonas Admassu I. Introduction pedestrians, animal- or human-drawn regular surface railway, metro or sub- or driven carts, wheel barrows, way, monorail, guided bus, trolley bus, This paper has been prepared at the bicycles and tricycles, draught animals etc. The rail transport system is solicitation of the Ethiopian Economic (horses, donkeys, camels, mules, classified as Light Rail Transit (LRT) Association, and it aims at exploring the elephants, etc.) and other hand drawn and Heavy Rail Transit (HRT). performance of Ethiopia's transport vehicles. sector. The paper has five main The other transportation mode, fairly chapters. The first chapter introduces The motorized vehicles are divided recent in appearance and modern in its the paper. The second chapter focuses into freight transport and human constitution, is air transport. The on the general concept of transport vehicles. Freight transport appearance on the scene of air transportation. Chapters three and four vehicles include pickups and trucks, or transport is historically linked to the describe the development of our lories, with a load capacity of up to use of balloons for navigational country's modern transportation 500 quintals. Human transport purposes. But the basis for the system and the objective conditions includes the whole range of vehicles development of the world's fastest characterizing the sector. The last beginning with bicycles and small cars transportation system is the series of chapter constitutes the visions the and extending all the way up to cross- experiments undertaken by the Wright author has regarding the future country buses and urban buses. Brothers. Like the other transport development of the country's transport modes described above, air transport is sector. Water transport is divided into local divided into domestic and and international (marine) transport international, on the one hand, and II. The Transport Sector: modes. Local transport mode includes human and freight transportation on Some Concepts river, lake, and canal transportation as the other. Presently the world uses well transportation on huge dams. airplanes ranging from the smallest, 2.1 Classification of Transport Marine transport includes both cargo accommodating only one person (the Modes and human transport across seas or pilot), to the largest, accommodating oceans between the ports of the 350 people and traversing long Five transport modes have been different countries. distances across lands and oceans to witnessed so far in the history of connect the different parts of the humanity's technological develop- Rail transport, which started about the globe. ment: namely, road transport, water time of the Industrial Revolution after transport, rail transport, air transport, the 1810s and 1820s, has been serving Finally, the other transport mode is and continuous flow system. the world for nearly 200 years. There are what is known as continuous flow many types of rail transportation. The first system, under which are subsumed Road transport consists of several phase featured a kind of train drawn by water or petroleum pipe, belt types or modes, which are divided into horses, followed by steam-powered train, conveyor, and slurry pipe, which is two main sub-categories: motorized followed by the street car. Next came the specially used in mines to transport and non-motorized. Under the non- different types of rail transport modes: the soil and minerals mixed with water. motorized category are included ____________________________________ * A talk prepared for the Vision 2020 Ethiopia Forum held on August 11, 2006 at Hilton Hotel. ** Ato Temesgen Aklilu obtained his BA degree in Economics from Asmara University in 1987 and MA degree in Regional Development from the Addis Ababa University in 2001. He worked in various institutions such as Addis Ababa Transport and Communication Bureau as department head of Transport system. Currently, Ato Temesgen is a lecturer in Civil Service College. Vol. 9 No. 4 17 Ethiopian Economic Association Economic Focus The Role of the Transport Sector in Ethiopia’s Economic Development L±n a^×Ñì@KS 2.2 The Contribution of In terms of creating job opportunities, while rail transport has a share of 50 Transportation to Socio- the share of the transportation sector in and 65 per cent, respectively, of Economic Development the developing countries is only 2-4% commuters and cargo. due to the low-level performance of Among the modes of transportation the economy, while in the developed When we sum it all up, other than the that played a big role in the history of countries, the figure stands at 4-8%. roles pointed out above, transportation humankind, road and water transport And the job creating role of the sector plays other important roles as well: it figure prominent [are in the forefront]. does not include the labor force helps countries in maintaining a Although the expansion of the deployed in the building of balance in the export market and transport sector is of tremendous infrastructure. generating foreign currency; it serves economic, social and political benefit, as a source of income generation both there are nevertheless some negative When the living condition of a for governments and the public; highly aspects to it. The fact that its energy country's population improves, the contributes to the maintaining of a consumption is high (16-35%), that it population's transport demand country's peace, political well being is foremost among the factors that increases accordingly. While the per and stability; plays the role of linking contribute to environmental pollution, capita transport demand in the rural areas and rural products to urban that it has been classified among the developing countries covers a travel centers; helps in increasing and world's killer diseases with regard to distance ranging between 500 and 200 interconnecting market outlets; it helps traffic accidents, and that it has Km, that of the developed countries shorten travel time; has the capacity to become a source of anxiety in terms of lies between 7000 and 10,000 Km. transport huge numbers of people and congestion constitute the negative side But, Americans are known to travel big volumes of cargo; makes big of the transport sector. between 17,000 and 20,000 Km contribution to the development of annually. Next to America are, in the tourism, entertainment, sports and The contribution of transportation to a order of their appearance, Norway, peaceful relationship among people. In country's development is high. Its Holland, New Zealand, France and short, the world has become one share of contribution to the GDP of a England. global village through the use of country is incontrovertible, though the transportation and communication. nature and extent of the contribution The most salient feature observed in The five continents, which are home to varies from country to country. (See the transport sector in relation to the human race, are now able to Table 1 in the Amharic version) growth in income is the increase in the communicate among themselves in a motorization of the public. When we matter just of minutes and hours. Transportation plays a big role in what translate this in terms of ranking, we is known in both national and find that, in the 1980s, the car-people III. A Brief History of the international trade as invisible trade. It ratio was 550-600 to every 1000 Development of Modern has been confirmed that its share in people. In this respect, the United Transportation in States of America is in the lead, this respect in many developed Ethiopia countries is as high as 26%. followed by France, Australia, Austria and England, respectively. The same 3.1 From Menelik to the End of the Dergue Period The role of transportation in the feature manifests itself in urban investment sector varies between the centers as well. When people's income When we speak of modern developed and the developing increase in urban centers, the tendency transportation in the Ethiopian context, countries. Because a good part of towards owning cars grows at the the reign of Emperor Menelik holds a infrastructure development has been expense of using public transportation. cardinal place. According to some taken care of in the developed writers, the idea of road construction countries, most of the investment there To look at but one example, in the started with the reign of Emperor focuses on automotive equipment, United States the share of Tewodros, when he used manual labor whereas the investment in the transportation in commuting stands at for clearing land for a pathway across developing countries focuses on 92%, that for cargo has a share only of which to haul his canon, the infrastructure development. Of the 25%. In the case of rail transport, the Sebastopol, to Mekdela. Since, total investment expenditure of share of commuters is a mere 1%, however, the purpose of the roadway developing countries, 30-35% goes to while cargo transportation has a had nothing to do with serving the infrastructure development, whereas in whopping 43%. In India, to take public, let us limit our observation to the developed countries the share of another example, road transport has a the fact alone and pass on to the reign expenditure for same is only 15-20%. share of 48 and 35 per cent, respectively, of cargo and commuters, of Menelik. Vol. 9 No. 4 18 Ethiopian Economic Association Economic Focus The Role of the Transport Sector in Ethiopia’s Economic Development L±n a^×Ñì@KS Using his close relationship with the Although, according to historical better services and attract passengers government of Austria, Emperor records, the first motor vehicle and clients flourished.