The government has embarked on a project to develop three One Stop Inspection Stations (OSISs) to reduce non-tariff barriers (NTBs) to trade which inhibit intra-trade in the East African region.

According to a statement by TradeMark East Africa (TMEA) which supports the project including other development partners, the three locations have been selected to capture the largest amount of transit traffic.

The three stations will be set up at Vigwaza in Coast Region, Manyoni in Singida Region and Nyakanazi in Kagera Region, where all regulatory authorities involved in vehicle inspection along the Central Corridor will conduct their inspections jointly at one location.

TMEA and the European Union (EU) have funded the preparation of the detailed design, supervision and construction of two of the three OSISs at Manyoni and at Nyakanazi, the statement said. The World Bank has agreed to support the preparation of the detailed design, supervision and construction of the third OSIS at Vigwaza, through the Southern Africa Trade and Transport Facilitation Project.

The stations will combine in one location activities of the Tanzanian National Roads Agency (TANROADS), which controls the weighbridges, the police force, which checks the condition of vehicles and the Tanzanian Revenue Authority (TRA), which carries out customs checks.

“The site at Vigwaza is the first major weighbridge location outside of Dar es Salaam capturing both central corridor and the Dar es Salaam Corridor traffic to Southern Africa.

“The site at Manyoni captures traffic from the central corridor and that from Kenya into Tanzania and the site at Nyakanazi handles Ugandan, Burundian and Rwandan vehicles,” reads the statement in part.

TANROADS has been appointed as the Executing Agency of the OSIS project and will be the primary counterpart within the Tanzania government in implementing the project.

The OSIS project will be a shared facility with an installed relevant ICT infrastructure to enable sharing of information.

It is expected that the stations would reduce time and cost of transporting transit goods along the Central Corridor by only requiring transit trucks to stop at three locations along the central corridor.

According to the Government of Tanzania’s Tanzania Programme “Big Results Now” (BRN) Initiative the project will reduce the number of official checks for Transit Trucks from 17 to 3 along the Central Corridor. “Not only will the OSIS reduce congestion of trucks parked along the roadsides and reduce accident rate caused by exhaustive drivers, but also most importantly, reduce time and costs through joint checks from the Police, TANROADS and Tanzania Revenue Authorities at the three sites,” adds the statement.