Tanzania is set to upgrade 10 airports in the year 2015/16 in order to accompany the country’s growing passenger and cargo traffic .
Suleiman Suleiman the Director General of TAA indicated that air traffic in Tanzania is growing at 20% average per year.
According to the State Minister responsible for Civil Society Relations and Coordination Dr. Mary Nagu’s speaking at a recent seminar in Dar Es Salaam, the targeted airports are Julius Nyerere International Airport (JNIA), Kilimanjaro International Airport (KIA), Songwe International Airport and the regional airports of Mwanza, Mtwara, Bukoba, Shinyanga, Kigoma, Tabora and Mafia.
The government plans to invest TZS 22 billion, TZS 7.7 billion, TZS 17.4 bilion TZS on JNIA, Songwe airport and KIA for construction of new passenger lounge, to install systems and aircraft navigation lights and a passenger lounge and to modernise the passengers’ lounge to accommodate 500,000 passengers.
The regional airports of Mwanza , Bukoba , Shinyanga and Kigoma will also receive investments of TZS 17.04 billion, TZS 400 million, TZS 22.74 billion and TZS 34.35 billion respectively.
This initiative is part of government’s extensive investment programme to develop international and regional airports.
According to the Tanzania Airports Authority (TAA) latest country traffic statistics in 2013, 5 million passengers and 28,000 tonnes of cargo were recorded at Tanzania airports.
