The Kilombero Valley Teak Company in Kilombero and Ulanga districts produces finished teak products such as parquet and provides employment to almost 600 persons in the two districts.
The Ambassador of Finland, Ms Sinikka Antila, visited the Kilombero Valley Teak Company in Kilombero and Ulanga districts on 25th January. The company produces finished teak products such as parquet and provides employment to almost 600 persons in the two districts. The purpose of the visit was to attend the stakeholder meeting on the socio-economic importance of the Kilombero-Ulanga ferry, which has had frequent break downs in the last 12 months.
The Ambassador recommended the government to partner with the private sector to improve the transport facilities in the country. “Public Private Partnership arrangement will help Tanzania attain its development agenda,” says the Ambassador Antila. Such arrangements especially in infrastructure development are common in Finland and could be beneficial to Tanzania, where the PPP Act was endorsed in 2010.
“I advise Tanzania to emulate Finland on the need to create a working relationship between the public and private sectors especially in infrastructure development,” she said.
The PPP arrangements could be applied to the ferry at Kilombero River: the current ferry is small and unreliable, affecting negatively businesses and any investment in the high potential Ulanga district. Kilombero and Ulanga districts are part of the Southern Agriculture Growth Corridor initiative, which spearheads the national Kilimo Kwanza strategy of agricultural growth. Finnish Embassy promised to fund a study that will assess the possibilities of creating a PPP for the purchase of a new ferry through partnership of private companies, districts and central government.
Text: Merja Mäkelä, Counsellor (Natural Resources)
Updated 2/7/2012
