The Chinese-built standard-gauge railway (SGR) linking Kenya's port city Mombasa to its capital Nairobi has witnessed 1,500+ days of safe operation, a milestone marking the achievements of joint development between China and African countries via the Belt and Road Initiative.
The Mombasa-Nairobi Railway connects Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, and Mombasa, the largest port in East Africa, with a total length of about 480 kilometers. It is a modern railway constructed with Chinese standards, Chinese technology, and Chinese equipment.
The Mombasa-Nairobi SGR, which replaced the meter-gauge railway that was constructed more than 100 years ago during British colonial rule, has been an important product that came out of the China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative and the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation held in Johannesburg, South Africa, in late 2015.
The Mombasa-Nairobi SGR is the first step in the grand plan to build an East Africa railway network that will eventually link Kenya with Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and South Sudan.
Different from the way the British colonists operated railways in the early days, the railways that China helped Africa build will be operated by African countries themselves, and China will be responsible for providing technical and service training.
“It is better to teach how to fish, than to provide the fish.” -- This is a basic idea that China has always emphasized when cooperating with other developing countries. I don't think what China is doing is a kind of "charity" or "aid". What China is doing is creating a new economic model of sustainable development.
What many poor developing countries, especially some African countries, lack is infrastructure and the funds and capacity to build it, as well as the talents to operate it. China can provide funds and build capacity, but China's goal is not only to find overseas markets for its excess infrastructure capacity, but through this cooperation, African countries can participate in the global economic cycle, so that they can develop low and medium-end industries and become a market for high-end products.