Rural connectivity in Africa: motorcycle track construction

Abstract

Motorcycle transportation has burgeoned in war-affected West Africa over the past decade. The penetration of motorcycle taxis deep into isolated rural communities has spread spontaneously and created direct and indirect employment opportunities for low-skilled youth, a category most susceptible to militia recruitment. Equally important, it has significantly contributed to lifting smallholder farmers out of poverty by reducing the costs of moving produce to markets, with motorcycles able to visit villages connected to feeder roads solely by footpaths.Nevertheless, state actors and international donors remain reluctant to allocate funds to rural track building/ upgrading, preferring to stick to more conventional, but expensive, construction/rehabilitation of rural roads accessible to four-wheeled vehicles. Through a case study of Liberia -still recovering from two civil wars and an Ebola health crisis -this paper argues that the impact of bringing community access through track construction/footpath upgrading is significant, particularly because track construction lends itself par excellence to the involvement of the rural communities themselves.

At the end of the feeder road: Upgrading rural footpaths to motorcycle taxi-accessible tracks in Liberia

“…The challenge faced by the Liberian government and its donors is not only to rehabilitate and maintain its existing road network, but to extend coverage to the nation's many isolated communities. However, if current road rehabilitation efforts and budget allocations are any indication, this could take many decades to achieve (Jenkins and Peters, 2016).…”

“…In 2016, we hypothesised that upgrading existing farmstead to village to roadhead footpaths to motorcycle-accessible tracks would be a cost-effective intervention, as compared to feeder road rehabilitation or construction, in order to allow farmers interested in expanding their marketable crop production to do so (Jenkins and Peters, 2016). While such an infrastructural intervention seems a straightforward oneand not particularly novel in Asiathere were, to our knowledge, no purposively upgraded tracks for the quickly expanding rural motorcycle taxi sector in SSA, let alone any data available on the socioeconomic impact of such interventions within the region.…”

“…As a result, infrastructure projects come at considerable cost. For example, a feeder road rehabilitated to MPW standards must be five metres wide, with water crossings that can accommodate cars, minibuses and trucks, and as a result costs approximately USD $50,000 per kilometre (Jenkins and Peters, 2016). However, with the market-driven spread of rural motorcycle taxis there may be a cheaper and quicker opportunity to connect off road communities to the main road network and to facilities and services often located in more urban areas.…”

Meeting Young People’s Mobility and Transport Needs: Review and Prospect

“…There is a rapidly growing literature on motorcycle taxi operations by young men (rarely are women involved, except as passengers), for example Burge on young male entrepreneurs in Sierra Leone, Olvera et al on west and central African cities, and Jenkins and Peters on post-conflict Liberia [97][98][99]. An extensive review of the recent literature on this theme is now available [100].…”

Editorial

“…In this issue, Burrow et al (2016) highlight findings of a systematic review of research supporting technology selection for rural roads in low-and lower-middle-income countries. This is complemented by a view on rural connectivity, which is brought out in this issue by Jenkins et al (2016) through a case study in Liberia on motorcycle track construction and upgrading of footpaths and tracks. The paper by Naimanye and Whiteing (2016) focuses on poverty-centred -352 http://dx.doi.org/10.1680/jtran.2016.169.6.351 ICE Publishing: All rights reserved allocation of transport funding in sub-Saharan Africa and provides a financing view.…”