Bridging South Sudan and the Trade Corridor Imperative

By Mayiik Ayii Deng*

South Sudan emerged in 2011 with boundless optimism, born from one of the most storied liberation movements in modern African history. Independence marked not merely the political separation from Sudan, but the collective aspiration of a people to govern themselves, to prosper, and to determine their own destiny. Yet, from the very beginning, our sovereignty bore a paradox. With abundant arable land, freshwater resources, and a wealth of untapped minerals, we were a nation endowed—not impoverished. We entered the world not as a country of desperation, but of promise.

However, beneath the jubilation of self-determination lurked a geopolitical and infrastructural constraint: landlocked-ness. This inherited condition, embedded in the legacy of colonial cartography, denied many African states—South Sudan among them—direct access to seaports. These arbitrary borders fractured Africa’s unity and handed the reins of economic access to coastal neighbors. Today, South Sudan’s reliance on foreign infrastructure—chiefly the pipelines and ports of Sudan and Kenya—for the export of oil and other commodities constitutes not just an economic challenge but a strategic vulnerability. It is a dependence that limits our economic sovereignty, complicates our foreign policy, and stifles domestic development.

Geography, like history, is not destiny—it is potential. South Sudan sits at the very heart of the African continent. It borders nine countries and bridges three major regions: East Africa, Central Africa, and North Africa. What some interpret as isolation is, in fact, strategic centrality. We are not the edge of Africa—we are its fulcrum. Rather than lamenting our location, we must leverage it.

Consider the town of Tali in Central Equatoria. Modest in size but rich in symbolism, Tali is situated near the geographical center of Africa. From this unassuming node, South Sudan can project influence in all directions—toward the Sahel in the northwest, the Great Lakes in the south, and the Horn of Africa in the east. This radial orientation is not merely symbolic; it positions our nation to serve as a trade interconnector, a diplomatic bridge, and a development catalyst for the continent.

Yet, to actualize this potential, we must invest in the infrastructure that binds nations together. As articulated in the African Union’s Agenda 2063, physical integration—through roads, railways, ports, and digital networks—is essential to unlocking intra-African trade, mobility, and prosperity. Ambitious projects such as the LAPSSET corridor and the Trans-African Highway reflect this vision, but their implementation has been uneven, stymied by political fragmentation, limited investment, and seasonal reliability.

In contrast, railways offer a compelling solution. Their permanence imposes predictability; their structure encourages governance. Unlike roads, which are vulnerable to weather and overuse, rail systems endure. They create corridors of certainty—channels through which goods, services, and ideas can reliably flow. Railways also embody a symbolic inversion: they turn borders from barriers into bridges, from lines of separation into conduits of shared value.

Indeed, a fee-free, internationally backed rail corridor would be more than a mechanism for moving commodities—it would be an instrument of peace, discipline, and unity. In regions long defined by conflict—such as South Sudan’s northern borderlands, or the unstable hinterlands of the Central African Republic and eastern Congo—a railway provides a counter-narrative. It replaces militarized frontiers with zones of commerce and cooperation. It cultivates economic interdependence, disincentivizing conflict and building mutual interest.

According to the African Development Bank, Africa’s logistics costs are between 30% and 40% higher than global standards. This inefficiency is not just a technical problem—it is a developmental deadweight, impeding growth and constraining competitiveness. A strategically designed rail corridor—from Douala on the Atlantic coast, through Bangui and Wau, and onward to Gambela and Addis Ababa—would drastically reduce transport times to major ports. It would bypass chokepoints like the Suez Canal and offer landlocked nations access to global trade routes on their own terms.

More than this, rail is a form of governance. It imposes timetables and enforces order. It reduces the informal rents and discretionary practices that plague road transport. It attracts private capital by lowering transaction risks. In short, a railway is both hardware and software—metal on the ground and mindset in motion.

However, the stakes go beyond commerce. This corridor is about recasting South Sudan’s identity—not only in the eyes of the world, but in the eyes of our own people. For too long, South Sudan has been imagined as a space of tragedy—defined by civil conflict, humanitarian crises, and dependency on international aid. This narrative, however entrenched, is incomplete. The proposed rail corridor challenges it. It positions South Sudan as a value creator, a logistics hub, and a steward of continental integration. It transforms us from recipient to partner, from landlocked to land-linked.

Specifically, the corridor would catalyze:

• The development of Special Economic Zones (SEZs) in towns such as Wau, Bor, and Rumbek. These zones would host agro-processing plants, storage depots, light manufacturing hubs, and logistics firms—allowing South Sudan to add value to its raw materials and export finished goods, rather than shipping out its wealth in crude form.
  
  
• New sources of government revenue, including transport taxes, customs duties, and logistical service fees. Unlike oil revenues—which are volatile and vulnerable to global price shocks—transport income is steady, diversified, and capable of forming a reliable budgetary base.
  
  
• Job creation and vocational training at scale. From civil engineers to track maintenance crews, from station managers to ICT technicians, the railway would generate tens of thousands of jobs. It would also offer young South Sudanese a dignified pathway into the labor market.
  
  
• A revolution in agriculture, particularly in the Sudd wetlands—the world’s largest contiguous freshwater ecosystem. With the right investments, the region could become a center for organic rice, sorghum, and high-value crops destined for eco-conscious markets in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. The railway would provide the critical link between farm and port, field and market.
  
  

Beyond material outcomes, railways reshape cultures. They encourage scheduling, planning, and efficiency. They reduce arbitrariness and enforce discipline. They lend dignity to business and credibility to investment. In this sense, infrastructure is not just a technical project—it is a civilizational project.

The Addis–Djibouti railway offers a model. Completed in 2016, it has increased Ethiopia’s logistics efficiency by over 70% in just five years and now handles more than 90% of that country’s international trade. It did not simply connect two cities—it connected a country to the world. With similar ambition, South Sudanese farmers, traders, and entrepreneurs could plug into a value chain that extends from the Nile to Nantes, from Wau to Warsaw.

This is not just a national aspiration—it is a Pan-African imperative.

The envisioned rail corridor, connecting the Atlantic to the Horn with South Sudan as the keystone, would serve as a tangible backbone for the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). While the AfCFTA lowers tariffs and harmonizes regulations, its success ultimately depends on the physical infrastructure that enables goods to move, services to flow, and people to connect. In short, we must inscribe integration in iron—not merely in ink.

As President Paul Kagame aptly noted, “Africa cannot outsource its integration.”

The responsibility is ours—to lay the tracks of tomorrow with the tools we have today. South Sudan can, and must, rise to that challenge. Not as a land cursed by geography, but as a nation called by it. Not as the forgotten periphery, but as the spine of continental renewal.

Let us then follow this corridor—not merely as a line of trade, but as a lifeline of peace, a path of progress, and a rail down which forgiveness and future flow. Along it, let us remap South Sudan—not as a line of hardship, but as the bridge that unites Africa’s promise and its people.

*Mayiik Ayii Deng is Former Minister for Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, and Former Minister for Presidential Affairs, and now Member of Parliament, Republic of South Sudan.