China will help finance the construction of A transportation University in Tanzania by providing US$62million, China’s Ambassador to Tanzania Wang Ke has announced.
Ms Ke says that the Transportation University in Tanzania will help strengthen relation ties between the two countries. President John Pombe Magufuli expressed gratitude for the kind gesture from China saying that the support will help strengthen transport services in the country.
Currently, Tanzania has the National Institute of Transport (NIT), a public higher learning institution which was established in 1975 as a training wing of the then National Transport Corporation (NTC).
NIT is charged with strengthening human resource capabilities of transport operatives and middle level managers. The institute is the only such training Institute in Sub- Saharan excluding South Africa, mandated by the government of Tanzania to offer training in transport.
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China is a major investor in Tanzania having helped finance various projects in the country. In June 2017,the east African country signed a $154 million contract with the state-run China Harbour Engineering Company (CHEC) to expand the main port in the commercial capital, Dar es Salaam.
Under the contract funded by a World Bank loan, CHEC, a subsidiary of the state-run China Communications Construction Co Ltd, will build a roll-on, roll-off (ro-ro) terminal and deepen and strengthen seven berths at Dar es Salaam port.
Government figures suggest that China’s investments to Tanzania have surged in recent years, reaching 2.5 billion US dollars as of May 2017, ten times the 2011’s 282 million dollars. India is the leading investor in Tanzania but China is threatening that position.
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Other Chinese supported projects in Tanzania include construction of Tanzania–Zambia Railway, TAZARA, and construction of Tanzania–China Textile Friendship Company, URAFIKI.
Mbara li Rice Farm and Kiwira Coal Mine in Mbeya region as well as establishment of Mahonda Sugarcane factory in Zanzibar are also part of Chinese funded projects.
Tanzania is the second largest economy in East Africa After Kenya.