In a bid to ease the pressure on the country’s roads, the Botswana government is developing a multi-modal freight strategy that makes more use of rail and air.
Minister of Transport and Communications, Kitso Mokaila, told Cabinet - when presenting the transport sector roadmap - that statistics revealed that 80% of freight in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) was moved by road.
“We need to ease such road usage in order to make our roads last longer and have fewer accidents in keeping with the target 2020 of reducing fatalities," he said.
Mokaila said his department would also work with other departments to ease public transport congestion and focus more on road maintenance and upgrades. The government collects around R1.6 billion annually from its road fund, he said.
