Planning of National Transport Infrastructure
In the Islamic Countries
21
2.4.1. Technical Factors in OIC Countries
In its strategy for the period 2012-2016, the Ministry of Equipment and Transport of the
Kingdom of Morocco took into account the guidelines of the government program, such as the
competitiveness of the national and regional economy, integrated and harmonious development
balanced transport infrastructure, pursuing an aggressive investment policy with
complementary modes of transport and the promotion of intermodal transport as well as the
adjustment of the planning, programming and funding, in addition to increase the level of supply
and quality of services5.
The same goes to the Republic of Uganda, where Establishing a long-term master plan to guide
rational and complementary development of all modes was one of the key features of policy and
strategy in its National Transport Master Plan 2008-2023.
Abu Dhabi has the Surface Transport Master Plan that includes projects to improve road, rail,
and public transport infrastructure. The Abu Dhabi Multimodal Freight Master Plan focuses on
the major forms freight transport (air, rail, road and sea) as well as other issues such as sector
governance and ensuring efficient multimodal connections.
Based on the questionnaires filled out by 23 OIC Member States, 57% of the respondents
ascertain that the level of holistic planning in the transport sector in their countries is high and
this was also confirmed by 38 % (the largest) of academics that expected their plans covered all
modes of transport. This shows that the various transport related aspects such as land use and
multimodal transport logistics are well integrated. The importance of multimodal freight
logistics in the NTI planning of the OIC countries is also shown by the fact that 70% of the
surveyed countries are signatory parties to international transport corridors.
An Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) has obviously been playing an important role in the
transport investment projects and is mandatory to undertake, as stated by 91% of the surveyed
Member States. It means that no transport project can be implemented before the EIA of the
particular project is accepted by the related environmental agency. Academics were less certain
with 25% believing that EIAs were not efficiently carried out and effectively monitored.
In terms of the application of socio-economic evaluation or cost benefit analysis (CBA) to
prioritize projects, it varies among the countries. 92% of the surveyed countries states that they
are applying this method when developing their NTI plans, while the application in the rest of
the surveyed countries is low. 87% of Academia believed that socio-economic criteria was at
least partially used to prioritise their national plans. Considering these survey results, it can be
concluded that the application of socio-economic evaluation and CBA to prioritize projects in
the NTI planning in OIC countries is going in the right direction.
2.4.2. Technical Factors Outside OIC Geography
Even though the importance of integration of land-use planning and transport planning is
acknowledged in policy documents in various developed countries, such integration is scarcely
present in practice (Te Brömmelstroet & Bertolini, 2009, Heeres et al., 2012 in Arts et al, 2014).
5 Official website of the Ministry of Equipment and Transport, Kingdom of Morocco