An analysis of the toll road policy of the South African National Roads Agency Limited

Abstract

The task entrusted to the South African National Roads Agency Limited (SANRAL) is to provide and manage a world class, sustainable national roads network for the country as cost-efficiently as possible, in order to encourage economic growth and develop the quality of life of all South Africans. Underlying this task was the acknowledgement that transport plays a vital role in the economic and social development of any country. To achieve this, the South African Government currently provides government-guarantees of several billion Rands to enable SANRAL to negotiate loans from the capital markets to fund the development and maintenance of the national toll road network. With regard to non-toll national roads, SANRAL receives per annum budgetary amounts to maintenance and development. However, such funding is only sufficient to maintain approximately 40% of the non-toll national road network. The abovementioned information and statistics imply that currently SANRAL may have insufficient funds available to develop and maintain the required primary national road network. SANRAL’s main objective is to obtain the funding required to develop and maintain the proposed primary national road network and to reduce the dependency on government-guaranteed debt. As a result the toll roads policy alternative was elected as a vehicle towards executing SANRAL’s mandate. This article explores the modalities associated with the toll road policy alternative pursued by SANRAL. Copyright