China and India are loaning Burma US$ 155 million to upgrade its railroad system and passenger services. The improved service will come with an increase in passenger fares, said the Xinhua news agency on Thursday.
The loans will be used to buy cargo carriages, locomotives and passenger coaches from China and India to replace outdated ones, said Popular News.
In Rangoon, about 130,000 passengers depend on rail transport daily, riding the city “circular trains,” which serve the suburbs.
Burma has 1, 252 passenger coaches, officials said, and around 32 per cent are four-decades old.
Of the 3,311 cargo carriages, around 56 per cent are four-decades old; Of Burma’s 386 locomotives, about 47 per cent are 30-year-old engines.
According to statistics, the length of Burma’s railroad system is about 5,726 kilometers (km). Burmese officials said that 475 km more railway lines are on the drawing board for the future, aimed at narrowing the development gap between urban and rural areas and promoting socio-economic development.
Besides China and India, Burma has bought locomotives from France, Germany and Japan.
According to an earlier report, the state-run Myanmar Railway was operating 27 locomotive repairing factories, 52 passenger coach maintaining factories, and the Myit Nge passenger coach and goods wagon factory.
