The Asian Development Bank (ADB) approved the Road Network Improvement and Maintenance Project II for a loan of $126 million in November 2003 to help the government of Bangladesh achieve economic growth and poverty reduction. Building on the success of an earlier phase and many other completed road sector interventions, the project sought to attain this overall goal/impact by improving transport efficiency and strengthening integrated road networks. The improvements were meant to provide farmers and the rural populations with better access to markets and increase cross-border traffic through Banglabandh, a major inland port in northern Bangladesh that provides a major trade link to India, Nepal, and Bhutan. They were also expected to encourage greater government allocations to road maintenance, promote private sector participation in road maintenance, and enhance road safety.
The project was to achieve its intended outcomes by (i) supporting the implementation of the National Land Transport Policy and the preparation of a new road master plan to replace the Road Master Plan of 1994; (ii) financing road improvements, including several regional and district roads, a district access road and 57 kilometers (km) of the national road to Banglabandh, and some of the missing links in the country’s major road networks; (iii) helping meet the cost of two years of priority maintenance activities on 300 km of roads annually; (iv) financing performance-based routine maintenance of 105 km of road, with monitoring training provided to Roads and Highways Department (RHD) officials; (v) conducting a safety audit of all project roads for improvement and maintenance and 800 km of other roads whose safety will afterwards also be improved; (vi) supporting the privatization of the operations and management of five vehicle inspection centers; and (vii) improving public awareness of the risks of HIV/AIDS and trafficking in women.
By completion, the project had improved about 86.9 km of regional and district roads and about 53.1 km of the national highway to Banglabandh. The final accomplishment was 45% short of the target for regional and district roads, and 36% below that for the Banglabandh national highway. The high quality of the completed project roads reduced vehicle operating costs by about 25%. Traffic growth on all district roads was around 7%–8% per year from 2008 to 2013 and this accounted for increased labor mobility. Land prices near the project roads increased because of better connectivity. Better access to local markets encouraged more people to start small businesses such as brick fields, vehicle repair shops, markets, rice mills, and fuel stations.
Project financial contributions to periodic maintenance works triggered government to pay greater attention to increasing its road maintenance allocations, respectively resulting in about a 5-fold and 3.5-fold increase in its routine and periodic maintenance budgets, between 2007 and 2013. Successful introduction of performance-based routine road maintenance promoted private sector participation in road upkeep. While still too early to assess, improvement of black spots along 195 km of roads and the project’s public road safety campaign are expected to lead to reduced traffic accidents.
Similarly, while there are yet no substantial data, the improved road condition to the Banglabandh port is highly likely to have facilitated closer integration and trade links among the South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation countries. With the opening of the Banglabandh port, the contribution of this project to subregional trade and commerce will greatly increase.
Operating under the Roads Division of the Ministry of Communication, the RHD served as the executing agency for the major components of the project. Day-to-day implementation of the components was spread among RHD officials/senior staff and relevant agencies.
