The COMESA Airspace Integration Project is expected to liberalize air transportation by harmonizing borders in over 15 countries. This has been revealed by Alexis Nzahabwanimana, the state minister for transport and infrastructure.

The minister was speaking at a 4-day legal and regulatory workshop on COMESA communication navigation surveillance and air traffic management which started in Kigali on Tuesday. “There is lack of integration and coordination in African civil aviation which still gives birth to different incidences… We need aircrafts to spend short time and less money on a trip,” he said.

The minister gave an example of how a three-hour flight to Angola from Rwanda takes over 15 hours because of passing via Kenya or Ethiopia. “That is a big delay and it costs money. Business people and aviation companies are affected by unnecessary long travels that could be reduced through direct short flights… losses of $300bn in African airlines need to be reduced,” he observed.

The project is preparing regulatory documents by sharing countries’ achievements so as to harmonize laws across the countries in aviation industry. The COMESA Project will reduce delays, travel costs, air traffic accidents, and carbon emissions from air transport.

Minister Nzahabwanimana said the losses occur because the sector has not yet developed and there are fewer passengers. Also, airlines are not easing movement due to borders that are not opened.

The project preparation will end in June 2017 and pave way for the implementation stage to make Africa open to movement rights. According to Dr. Abu Sufian Daffala, the director of infrastructure and logistics at COMESA, AFDB has provided $10m to conduct studies of the project. The European Union has also pledged €8m for security, safety and accidents in African aviation

The integration project will address poor airport and airspace infrastructure development, human resource deficiency and transit facilities among others,” said Dr. Daffala.