Planning of National Transport Infrastructure
In the Islamic Countries
1
Executive Summary
Transport accounts for between 2% and 11% of GDP worldwide and is one of the prime
economic sectors. It affects the price of goods, the cost of labour, and the general wellbeing of
society. The efficient management of the transport sector by government therefore needs to be
addressed appropriately. The importance of transport infrastructure development should not
be underestimated and better planning is naturally the first step to achieve a better performance
of the transportation system, which will in turn contribute to the economic and social
development of the nations.
Objectives of the Study
This Study aims at identifying the basic concepts and steps of the NTI planning and factors
affecting their success, investigating the major and successful planning practices regarding NTI
outside the OIC geography, analysing the current NTI planning practices and proposing
recommendations for better practices in OIC Member States. The literature review and analyses
conducted for this study are based on a framework of seven subject areas, in order to better
understand the lessons learned from the best practices, and at the same time to identify the main
challenges faced by the OIC Member States in practicing their NTI planning. The seven areas of
the framework, which were used as a basis for the entire report, are: (1) political and legislation
factors, (2) institutional and organizational factors, (3) technical factors, (4) procedural factors
and financing, (5) content of NTI planning, (6) data collection method, and (7) monitoring and
evaluation system. An in-depth investigation of these framework areas is carried out for NTI
planning practices outside and within the OIC geography.
NTI planning practices in OIC geography
The general situation of NTI planning practices in the OIC Member States for each of the seven
framework areas is outlined as follows:
Framework area Aspects of analysis
1. Political and legislation  The Asian countries tend to not having a long-term national
transport master plan (NTMP), but they seem to perform better
than their African and the Middle Eastern counterparts who have
an NTMP. The NTI planning in Asia is included in a medium-term
plan that covers all types of infrastructure, not only transport.
 A national transport policy is mostly absent. A policy provides an
opportunity for structured stakeholder and transport user
engagement to discuss a wide range of issues in the dynamic and
rapidly changing transport sector.
2. Institutional and
organizational
 An institutional gap between the national and regional
governments is very common.
 Transport planning agencies are sometimes not multidisciplinary
and cross sectoral. They also do not really have adequate capacity
to prepare plans relying totally on outsourcing.
3. Technical factors  Most of the NTI plans focus more on road and rail infrastructure
with no attention to non-motorised transport.