The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has, lately, emerged as Africa’s main international investor, channelling an estimated USD 130 billion between 2019 and 2023.
A lot of this exercise has been concentrated in transport and logistics, the place Emirati corporations equivalent to DP World and AD Ports function port terminals throughout the continent, whereas Emirates Airways and Etihad Airways dominate air visitors. More and more, nonetheless, Abu Dhabi is extending its attain into rail, from the Horn of Africa to the Gulf of Guinea.
In January 2025, the UAE confirmed plans to finance a 250-kilometre railway linking Tog Wajale on the Ethiopian border to Berbera in Somaliland. The venture, value USD 3 billion, will present landlocked Ethiopia, which depends on Djibouti for 90 per cent of its commerce, with a significant various path to the ocean. The road builds on DP World’s USD 442 million growth of Berbera Port, accomplished in 2021, and is anticipated to reshape commerce flows throughout the Horn of Africa.
Increasing rail corridors in East Africa
Kenya has turn out to be a focus for Emirati engagement. In early 2025, Nairobi sought funding for the second part of its Customary Gauge Railway (SGR), a 468-kilometre extension from Naivasha to Kisumu and Malaba. With Beijing reluctant to advance new loans after financing the primary Mombasa–Naivasha part, Kenya turned to Abu Dhabi. Etihad Rail has since signed a memorandum of understanding with Kenya Railways to conduct feasibility research for a brand new nationwide rail community and potential involvement within the SGR. Discussions embrace a attainable USD 4 billion concession to increase freight operations, enabling Kenya to strengthen commerce hyperlinks with Uganda, Rwanda and South Sudan.
Throughout his Might go to to Kenya and Uganda, UAE International Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan oversaw the signing of memorandums of understanding with each nations. In Kampala, the settlement goals to modernise Uganda’s nationwide railway and increase cross-border commerce, complementing different Emirati ventures such because the USD 4 billion oil refinery being constructed by Alpha MBM Investments.
Strategic ties with Central Africa
The railway push has additionally prolonged to Central Africa. In Might 2025, Etihad Rail hosted a ministerial assembly in Abu Dhabi with representatives from Chad, Cameroon, and South Sudan. It signed a memorandum of understanding with Chad’s Nationwide Railway Workplace to replace feasibility research for the 800-kilometre N’Djamena–Ngaoundéré line, which might join the Chadian capital to Cameroon’s Douala port. The venture can be the primary main new railway in Cameroon since 1972 and is taken into account vital for Chad’s financial diversification and export capability.
The UAE’s rising engagement in railway initiatives underlines its ambition to consolidate a presence that enhances its established function in ports and aviation. For African companions, the arrival of Emirati capital and experience provides a way of modernising outdated networks, most of which had been constructed in the course of the colonial interval. It additionally diversifies financing sources past China, which has dominated railway development on the continent for a era. Moreover, Emirati railway engagement will assist poverty alleviation efforts, as they’ll result in employment alternatives, the emergence of improvement corridors, improve mobility in addition to cross-border commerce, at a time when the African Union and regional financial communities are endeavor initiatives to extend intra-regional commerce.
