Charles K. Kaira

Transportation Needs of the Rural Population in Developing Countries

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Summary

The data collection in thee survey roughly reveals the living conditions in the community. The majority of the inhabitants are subsistence farmers whose cash incomes range between K.Sh. 500 and 2.000 (US $ 60-250). Less than 20 % of the inhabitants, have bad education beyond primary level and even then still 30 % have had no formal education. Formal employment negligible. The majority being employed in government service. Self employment is in the form of craft or business. Although 90 % of households live in semi-permanent structures, water is quite a major problem as it can be drawn only from river points. Consequently, water carrying poses the greatest transport problem to households.

A survey of transport vehicles owned by households has shown that acquisition and maintenance costs of a bicycle and animal-cart are comparable to the annual cash incomes of households. However. it was revealed that the use of bicycles is limited to males. Utilization of the animal-cart for transporting loads is very low and limited calling for new approaches to improve the situation.

The survey disclosed that as many as 80 % of households sold less than 500 kg of respective cash crops grown in the area. Further. 72 and 10 % of cash crop products were respectively transported by animal-cart and backloading travelling mainly along paths rather than roads. This, is contrary to what is expected by feeder-road planners who argue that construction of feeder roads lowers transport costs of farm products resulting into a majority of them beeing transported by road.

Public transport in the area is quite adequate. However. the use of public transport is low and there does not seem to be a significant difference in the use of public transport between Village(A) which has easy access and Village (B) with no easy access. Furthermore, the travel range of the inhabitants is quite short with a majority of trips rarely having a triple length of more than 7 km.