The rehabilitation project of the Belabo-Ngaoundéré railroad (330 km) in Cameroon is due to reach a financial close in July 2023, we learned following the 39th session of the Inter-ministerial Committee on Railway Infrastructure (Comifer).

After more than three years of negotiations, the Cameroonian government and the French Development Agency (AFD) will finally sign a CFA110 billion agreement. The resources to be provided by the French Fund will be in addition to the CFA80 billion already raised from the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the European Union (EU). The related financing agreements were signed in December 2021.

The next step after the July deal will be the effective start of this infrastructure project, which was initially slated for 2021. The feasibility study for the project, conducted by the Spanish group Typsa (composed of independent engineering consulting firms) was validated on March 6, 2020, during a workshop held in Yaoundé. Let’s note that since its inauguration in 1974, the railway line between Belabo and Ngaoundéré has never been renovated. The forthcoming rehabilitation work on this section will be the second major project in Cameroon's railway sector in the last 30 years, with the first being the renovation of the over 175 km line between Batschenga (Centre) and Ka'a (East).

A third major project is expected in the coming years with the rehabilitation of the railroad between Douala and Yaoundé, and the modernization of the railway signaling between Douala and Ngaoundéré. This project (worth CFA212.7 billion) is part of the larger project to enhance road and rail infrastructure on the Douala-Ndjamena corridor, in which Cameroon and Chad plan to invest CFA471.7 billion overall by 2031.

Source: Business in Cameroon