Mombasa

Kenya's second largest city, the ancient Muslim Indian Ocean port of Mombasa, serving Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and Zaïre, is one of the most important platform in the Eastern Africa but it is not equipped enough for large traffic. Therefore a rehabilitation program is being undertaken.

Kenya enjoys an extensive, if deteriorating, infrastructure, a generally well-educated population and a strong entrepreneurial tradition.

Mombasa is the best and most important deep-water port in the region, despite deteriorating equipment and problems with inefficiency and corruption. Nairobi and Mombasa, Kenya's main trading cities, have sufficiently large warehousing facilities. Most of the warehouses are for private warehousing; however, some specialized ones provide bonded warehousing services.

The Port of Mombasa, with a rated annual capacity of 22 million tons, is Kenya's main seaport and serves most East and Central African countries. It is a deep-water port with 21 berths, two bulk oil jetties and dry bulk wharves that can handle all size ships. The port offers specialized facilities, including cold storage, warehousing, and container terminal. It serves most international shipping lines and has an average annual freight throughput of about 8.1 million tons, of which 72 percent are imports.

Kenya Ports Authority (KPA) manages the port operations. There are plans to replace or refurbish some of the equipment at the port. A private international firm has been contracted to manage and operate the container terminal in Mombasa. Inland container depots, managed by KPA, exist in Nairobi, Eldoret, and Kisumu.

Corruption is pervasive in most sectors, particularly in government procurement and dispute settlement. A police unit was recently established at the Kenya Revenue Authority to tackle tax evaders, including scandals involving duty evasion at the Port of Mombasa.
Uganda's most troublesome infrastructure problems lies in Kenya - the corrupt and inefficient port of Mombasa and the poor condition of the road between Mombasa and Kampala. The vast majority of Uganda's exports and imports travel through this port and road. Generally, transporting a container of goods between Mombasa and Kampala will take twice the time and expense as transporting that same container between London and Mombasa.

Kenya has a reasonably well-developed international and domestic air transport infrastructure. The country has three international airports: Nairobi's Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA), Mombasa's Moi International Airport and Eldoret International Airport which became operational in April 1997.

Source : globalsecurity.org