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Agriculture remains an important economic sector in Africa, employing a large share of the labor force and earning foreign exchange. Among others, transport connectivity has long been a crucial constraint in Africa. In theory, railways have a particularly important role to play in shipping freight and passengers at low cost. However, most African railways were in virtual bankruptcy by the 1990s. Using a large sample of data comprised of more than 190,000 households over eight years in Ethiopia, the paper estimates the impacts of rail transport on agricultural production. Methodologically, the paper takes advantage of the historical event that a major rail line connecting the country to the regional hub, the Port of Djibouti, was abandoned in the 2000s. With spatially highly disaggregated fixed effects and instrumental variables incorporated, an agricultural production function is estimated. The elasticity with respect to port connectivity is estimated at 0.276. The use of fertilizer is also found to increase with transport cost reduction, supporting the fact that a large amount of fertilizer is imported to Ethiopia.

Agriculture Production --- Transport Infrastructure

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Rail transport generally has the advantage for large-volume long-haul freight operations. The literature generally shows that shipping distance, costs, and reliability are among the most important determinants of people's modal choice among road, rail, air, and coastal shipping transport. However, there is little evidence in Africa, although the region historically possesses significant rail assets. Currently, Africa's rail transport faces intense competition against truck transportation. With firm-level data, this paper examines shippers' modal choice in Tanzania. The traditional multinomial logit and McFadden's choice models were estimated. The paper shows that rail prices and shipping distance and volume are important determinants of firms' mode choice. The analysis also finds that the firms' modal choice depends on the type of transactions. Rail transport is more often used for international trading purposes. Exporters and importers are key customers for restoring rail freight operations. Rail operating speed does not seem to have an unambiguous effect on firms' modal selection.

Modal Choice --- Rail Transportation --- Transport Infrastructure

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In order to achieve a transition from a transport system centred on the individual car to one centred on (electrified) rail a new focus in infrastructure planning is needed. The preparation of project proposals for the Federal Transport Infrastructure Plan 2030 on the sub-national level in Germany provides an opportunity to study decision-making processes in ministries and compare their respective results in this respect.Using document analysis, expert interviews, qualitative content analysis as well as QCA, this thesis in political science analyses how decision-making processes within bureaucracies impact the decision output in transport infrastructure planning. It contributes to the discussion on bureaucracy-politics interactions that is relevant beyond the German case.One result is that ministries tend to use complex decision-making processes for topics deemed salient as long as the available capacity permits it. Consequently, in order to conduct legitimacy-enhancing steps – such as public participation – a well-funded bureaucracy is indispensable.

transport infrastructure --- planning --- Intra-ministerial decision-making

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In order to achieve a transition from a transport system centred on the individual car to one centred on (electrified) rail a new focus in infrastructure planning is needed. The preparation of project proposals for the Federal Transport Infrastructure Plan 2030 on the sub-national level in Germany provides an opportunity to study decision-making processes in ministries and compare their respective results in this respect.Using document analysis, expert interviews, qualitative content analysis as well as QCA, this thesis in political science analyses how decision-making processes within bureaucracies impact the decision output in transport infrastructure planning. It contributes to the discussion on bureaucracy-politics interactions that is relevant beyond the German case.One result is that ministries tend to use complex decision-making processes for topics deemed salient as long as the available capacity permits it. Consequently, in order to conduct legitimacy-enhancing steps – such as public participation – a well-funded bureaucracy is indispensable.

Society & social sciences --- transport infrastructure --- planning --- Intra-ministerial decision-making

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En la decada de los noventa hemos asistido a un incremento espectacular de la liberalizacion de las politicas de transporte. Lamentablemente, la transicion del gobierno hacia su nuevo papel esta siendo mas complicada de lo previsto, requiriendo ajustes con el fin de garantizar que se obtengan las ganancias financieras y de eficiencia esperadas. El objetivo de este libro es ayudar a los gobiernos a aprender a asumir estas nuevas tareas. En muchos paises ya existe un numero elevado de operadores privados, y los reguladores necesitan llevar a cabo acciones efectivas para conseguir que la participacion privada proporcione resultados sostenibles, eficientes y justos en el sector del transporte. El libro proporciona una vision panoramica de las razones economicas que justifican la regulacion. Asimismo, resume las tendencias de los procesos de privatizacion y regulacion observadas en el sector para ofrecer una vision general de las principales opciones que brinda la experiencia internacional, recogiendo algunos casos de estudio con fines ilustrativos. Tambien abarca la regulacion de precios y subraya los problemas y los procedimientos relacionados con la fijacion de precios y analiza los temas relevantes relacionados con la regulacion de la calidad. Con el fin de facilitar la tarea de los reguladores, en la ultima seccion describe los indicadores principales que permiten un seguimiento de la evolucion de las principales variables de las actividades de transporte.

Privatization --- Spanish Translation --- Toll Roads --- Transport --- Transport Infrastructure