New Routes

Zambia has discussed extensively, the need for developing our trade capacity with special emphasis on our traditional trading partners namely; South Africa and the European Union.

Our history of trade indicates that our trade relationships with our much larger trading partners has not impacted very positively on the growth of our own economy, but relegated Zambia to a useful market for foreign products. Much of the state of affairs may be due to the basic fact that Zambia is a much smaller and weaker economy than those of our traditional trading partners, and therefore struggles to achieve equity in the trading relationships.

Zambia has eight physical neighbours and two additional virtual neighbours being Burundi and Rwanda. Zambia has not taken full advantage of its neighbourhood except for small scale cross border trading. Opportunities exist for expanding on our neighbourhood training regime such that by default, we can develop a trading market comprising of the eleven countries. There are many synergies amongst the eleven countries and the characters of each economy can complement each other rather than aggressively compete against each other.

The inter country infrastructure installed and being developed offers new opportunities for neighbourhood trade. Chirundu border post has a new bridge into Zimbabwe, and the customs facilities have been upgraded to facilitate increased and more efficient trade between the two countries. The Nakonde border post has experienced some renovations and the customs facility has been revamped to promote greater trade between Zambia and Tanzania. Kazangula has also seen improved customs infrastructure to support the business activity between Zambia and Botswana. A modern bridge was erected at Katima Mulilo to open up trade routes between Zambia and Namibia with new access to the Atlantic Ocean port of Walvis Bay. A new bridge was recently installed at Chembe to link the Luapula Province with the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), in a bid to promote trade between Zambia and the DRC, and to provide a trade corridor between the Copperbelt and the Luapula Province through the Congo Pedicle.

It is quite clear to see that some trade routes are much busier than others due to the traditional business relationships since Independence in 1964. The opportunities to develop new trade routes to include the Mwami border post which opens a trade corridor between Zambia and Malawi, and the Chanida border post which can expose business options between Zambia and Mozambique, should be given some special attention for alternate trade routes that may be more beneficial to Zambia than the current routes taking central focus.

The Mpulungu Harbour offers some special opportunities to trade with Eastern DRC, Western Tanzania, Burundi and Rwanda. Currently the only major trade taking place at Mpulungu is exports of Cement from Zambia and Tanzania.

Zambia has not paid much attention to trading with the Middle East in respect to the export of food products such as beef, goats, vegetables and fruit. Zambia’s exports tend to go to Europe to be re-packaged and re-exported to the Middle East with the major income from this trade, going to the European Union.

Zambezi Airlines has recently acquired a new aircraft to service the region. The challenge for developing new routes where the best and consistent return on investment will impact on the sustainability of the business is essential. The domestic and regional budget airline service is worth considering for catering for the neighbourhood inter country travel, as a strategy for survival during this global economic recession.

Published 2nd June 2009