Chinese Government provides RMB 8.9 million grant — via ETCA — for general budget support to Tanzania Railways Corporation

On May 19, 2018, the Chinese Government and Tanzania’s Ministry of Finance signed an Economic and Technical Cooperation Agreement (ETCA), which committed RMB 409 million (TZS 146.47 billion) of grant funding for multiple projects.

The Tanzanian Permanent Secretary Ministry of Finance and Planning Dotto James and the Chinese Ambassador to Tanzania Wang Ke signed the agreement.

The grant proceeds were allocated to three different projects: (1) approximately RMB 386,186,249 (TZS 138.3 billion) for the National Institute of Transport (NIT) University of Transport Construction Project (captured via Record ID#59603); (2) approximately RMB 8,935,618 (TZS 3.2 billion) for a Standard Gauge Railway Feasibility Study (captured via Record ID#59605); and (3) approximately RMB 8,991,465 (TZS 3.22 billion) for general budget support to the Tanzania Railways Corporation (captured via Record ID#88323).

The acting deputy director of operations at the Tanzania Railways Corporation — a Tanzanian state-owned company — said at the time that the Chinese government grant would 'help reduce government costs which were to be used for work...on construction of the Central Railway.'