China flags off $1.4 billion revamp work on Mao-Era African rail

Zambia initiated a $1.4 billion overhaul of a key railway linking the southern African nation’s copper region to a port on the Indian Ocean, in a ceremony that marked the first visit by a Chinese premier to the country in almost three decades.

The launch of the upgrade by Zambian President Hakainde Hichilema was attended by Chinese Premier Li Qiang and Tanzanian Vice President Emmanuel Nchimbi. It follows a September agreement by the three nations to revamp a route originally financed and built with Beijing’s assistance under Mao Zedong in the 1970s.

“The Tazara railway is a signature project of China-Africa corporation,” Li said in a speech in Lusaka, the capital, on Thursday. “China is ready to work with Zambia and Tanzania to let this railway carry hope, brim with new vigor in the new era and provide more momentum for the development of Tanzania, Zambia and Africa as a whole.”

The 1,860-kilometer (1,156-mile) Tanzania-Zambia railway has fallen into disrepair, operating at only a fraction of its original capacity. Once completed, the upgrade will ease severe congestion at regional border crossings, where most cargo currently moves by road, as Zambia and neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo ramp up copper production.