![]() ![]() For me, the poor state of the roads have a daily impact, as I try to move around to do my reporting and care for my family. Prices have been on the rise since April, because some goods are running in short supply and because trips to urban centers are becoming increasingly costly. The terrible state of the roads leads to other negative consequences, too. Young people along the roadsides happily took our cash, 1,000 or 2,000 Congolese francs (about 62 cents or $1.23) at a time, to push the bike through the muddiest bits. Numerous times during the journey, we had to get off the motorcycle to walk through the mud. Recently, I was traveling to Butembo for a family funeral. Yet, in the last four years, not a single road mender or contractor has been hired. We all wonder where our money goes when we pay road toll after road toll to the Fonds National d’Entretien Routier, the national road maintenance fund. ![]() It’s a constant topic of conversation here. The last rainy season left things a mess, and no one has bothered even to begin repairs. In 2017, the trip to Goma took, on average, four hours. At numerous points along the way, travelers encounter muddy quagmires. The 201-kilometer (130-mile) stretch between Kirumba and Goma is rendered impassable several times per year, thanks to rain. And, more than anything, we rely on our roads, the conditions of which range from bad to worse. Many of the goods are then resold locally by small businesses and microbusinesses.īut to get to and from those urban centers, we rely on cars or motorcycles. To purchase everything – food, clothing, construction materials or almost anything else one can think of – people travel to Goma, the capital of the North Kivu province, or to nearby Butembo. Urban centers provide the basis for livelihoods in even the most remote parts of DRC. But one thing that has stayed the same is that we still rely on goods from nearby cities for our basic needs. In that time, I’ve seen many things change here. KIRUMBA, DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO - I’ve lived in Kirumba, a village in the Lubero Territory, a remote part of DRC’s North Kivu province, for most of my life. ![]()
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