NRZ goes on regional offensive

THE National Railways of Zimbabwe (NRZ) has embarked on a regional offensive to unlock business potential in southern and eastern African countries through full exploitation of the north-south corridor.

Following an invitation by the National Rail Company of Congo, the NRZ delegation led by board chairman, Advocate Martin Dinha, is in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to seek synergies to increase the movement of people and goods in the Sadc region.

"DRC and Zimbabwe enjoy strong bilateral ties, so it is also critical that we strengthen economic ties. We were invited here to discuss the smooth operations of the North South Corridor," said Adv Dinha in response to questions from Business Chronicle.

"We want to ensure smooth movement of freight in this important corridor. We also had an opportunity to discuss with the industrialists and mining associations in this region."

He said his team has agreed to mutualize the utilisation of resources so that they are able to offer seamless services to their customers.

The board chair noted that DRC, by being a source market for mineral resources, presents a huge opportunity to NRZ to generate the much-needed foreign currency to buy locomotives spares, new rolling stock and tractive power to enhance its business.

"As you know we have been in Turkey to source investment in the railways infrastructure, but we also need to solve the regional challenges facing the railways sector so that as investment comes in there are no bottlenecks on our corridor" he said.