Accra: Ghana risks losing potential cargo transport business to C´te d'Ivoire and Togo due to poor road conditions, despite having competitive ports, the World Bank has warned.
According to Ghana Web, the World Bank's 10th Ghana Economic Update estimates that transporting a 40-foot container from Tema to Ouagadougou costs between US$2,500 and US$3,500, with the journey taking anywhere from four days to two weeks, largely due to poor road conditions and disruptions along the route. The report specifically highlights that moving a container from Tema to Ouagadougou can take between 4-14 days, depending on road conditions and checkpoint delays.
Ghana competes directly with C´te d'Ivoire's Abidjan and Togo's Lom© ports for transit trade to Burkina Faso and Mali. However, the challenge is not primarily at Tema Port, where the US$1.5 billion Terminal 3 expansion increased container-handling capacity from 800,000 to 3.7 million TEUs, and customs reforms have reduced container turnaround time to about three days.
The major challenge lies along the 818-kilometre Tema-Paga corridor, Ghana's main road link to Burkina Faso. The report noted that about 35% of the country's transit routes were in fair to poor condition as of 2017, with overloaded trucks further worsening the damage. This represents a significant gap in international transit and logistics, despite the figure appearing low.
Ghana's road maintenance funding is also falling short of requirements. The Road Fund covered only 37% of maintenance needs in 2024, compared with a target of 65%. The World Bank estimates that Ghana's trunk roads require about US$685 million annually for maintenance. Although transit cargo through Tema increased from 116,000 metric tonnes in 2001 to more than 1.4 million tonnes in 2020, the report warns that without improved road infrastructure and reliable maintenance funding, Ghana risks losing more of its growing regional transit trade to Abidjan and Lom©.
Ghana has invested heavily in expanding its port capacity, but the World Bank's assessment highlights the need to improve the road network connecting the port to landlocked markets.