Nairobi, Kenya, 31 March – The “Unity bridge,” a 720-metre structure linking Tanzania to Mozambique over the Rovuma River, is expected to be ready at the beginning of 2009, Kenyan newspaper The East African reported Sunday in Nairobi.

According to the paper, Chinese company China Geo Engineering Corporation, which is building the US$40 million bridge, has already installed most of the pillars that are to hold up the platform linking the Mozambican province of Cabo Delgado to the Mtware region of Tanzania.

The bridge is the Chinese company’s second large project in Africa, and its first was in Algeria where it built a water supply network worth US$12 million.

The bridge is part of the Mtwara Development Corridor, a multi-million dollar project to build roads and railways and expand existing ports to ease the process of distributing goods to some regions of Tanzania, Malaw, Zambia and Mozambique considered to be some of the poorest parts of the world. (macauhub)