research of torism in tanzania

RESEARCH ON USER NEEDS AND MANAGEMENT OF PUBLIC
TRANSPORT SERVICES IN DAR ES SALAAM

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Dar es Salaam is among rapid growing cities in Africa. Expansion of the city has posed challenges in terms of city planning, regulation and provision of urban transport services, which depend on road based transport services rendered by numerous individual bus operators. The existence of numerous individual bus operators in the business, each owning a small fleet coupled with lack of clear understanding of relationships of key actors in the business; namely: owners, crew and passengers poses a further serious challenge in striking a supplydemand balance of urban transport services.
Study on User Needs and Management of Public Transport Services in Dar es
Salaam is an attempt to understand relationships between owners, crew and passengers with a view to bringing harmony in the industry. The study also looks into preferences of operators and operatives on the mode of operation for urban public transport business in order to understand motives behind proliferation of individual operators and disincentives of forming companies. On the supplydemand balance, the study provides guidelines on the allocation of buses into various routes taking into consideration user needs and other route characteristics. In studying the problem at hand, literature review has been undertaken extensively; the emphasis however has been on the historical background of the city urban transport and urban transport studies which were carried out in Dar es
Salaam City. Experiences of transport in other cities in Sub Saharan Africa have also been drawn.
The study was carried out in nine representative Wards of Dar es Salaam Region.
The Wards were evenly distributed in three districts of Kinondoni, Ilala and
Temeke.

Specific Objectives

Specific objectives of the research are
:
(a) to determine bus ownership profile and turn over of operators;
(b) to determine the relationship between owners and bus crew;
(c) to determine the relationship between passengers and bus crew;
(d) to determine perceptions on preferred mode of operation for urban transport business;
(e) to establish urban routes characteristics; and
(f) to determine required number of buses in different routes

Location of the Study
The study was based in Dar es Salaam. A total of nine Wards in Kinondoni, Ilala and Temeke Municipal Councils were included in the study.

DATA COLLECTIONS

Given the diversity of the study objectives, a number of survey types were used.
They include the following:

(a) passengers questionnare;

(b) personal interviews with bus drivers

(C) Bus Owners Interviews

Bus Owners Interviews Interviews for Bus owners’ facilitated collection of information on the following:

(a) perceptions on factors critical in selection of bus routes;

(b) how they asses quantity of buses in various routes;

(c) Relationship including terms and conditions of employment between bus
Owners and crew

(c) perceptions on preferred mode of operation for public transport business (d) source of income for their ownership of buses

(F) Mode of revenue collection

Relationships between Passengers and Operatives
With respect to relationships between passengers and operatives, the study
Focused on the following passengers’ opinions:

(a) language of operatives

(b) the extent to which operatives observed bus carrying capacity;

(c) the use of radio or music player in the bus;

Relationship between Bus Owners and Crew

Terms and Conditions of Employment
In studying relationships in terms of terms and conditions of employment
Between bus owners and crew, the focus was on the following:

(a) recruitment of drivers and conductors

(b) remuneration and other Benefits;

(c) operatives working hours;

(d) route selection decision;

ANALYSIS AND DISCUSION OF RESULTS

A sample of bus drivers revealed that most buses were owned by individuals as
They accounted for 91.3%. Cooperative ownership accounted for 3.8%, family
3.1% and companies 1.8%. The finding was also observed in the dataset collected
From bus owners who indicated at least 85.9% of buses were owned by
Individuals.

It was further revealed that 80% of individual owners had utmost 3 buses
Meaning that provision of urban public transport in Dar es Salaam is dominated
By individuals with small fleet size each. This constrains regulation and law
Enforcement as a result of managing many and varied owners

Basing on collected data, most of the daladala owners in Dar es Salaam City had an average of 4 years of experiences in the business. However, majority of them were relatively new with utmost 2 years in business

The study showed that majority (51.5%) of owners entered the urban public transport business with minibuses with carrying capacity between 15-24 passengers. It was also found that very few (1%) owners joined the business with large capacity buse

At the time of study, operators who had one bus and two buses were 71.8% and
28.1% respectively. However, in order to establish the growth of urban public transport operators in Dar es Salaam city, the study compared fleet sizes between business commencement and time of study

The study showed that majority (61.6%) of bus operators depended on own funds. Loans and grants as sources of capital accounted for 28.3% and 12.1% respectively. Very few (6.1%) obtained capital from other sources such as family inheritance. The study revealed that majority (98%) of owners resorted to a fixed daily target revenue mode of revenue collection and only 2.0% used total daily collected revenue mode.

The study established that most (37.3%) drivers were recruited after being introduced to owners by friends. About 26.3% of drivers were recruited through owners’ head hunting while recruitment of bus owners’ relatives accounted for6.2%, presumably, due to lack of accountability

Conductors recruited by drivers accounted for 89% while those recruited by bus owners were 11%. This implies that bus owners have minimal direct relationship with bus conductors reflecting dominancy of drivers as leaders in bus operations and the use of fixed target revue collection mode

Statutory working hours for employees by the time the study was conducted were eight (8) hours per day. The study investigated if drivers observed the stipulated working hours. The study revealed that the average working hours for the bus drivers was 16.02 hours. Majority (62.5%) of drivers started work at 0500 hours and closed at 2100 hours
On the other hand, drivers who had resting time (15.6%) indicated that the buses were being driven by temporary drivers known as deiwaka (day workers) while they rested. Day worker represented 81.48 % of the temporary engaged drivers during resting times. Less than half (41%) of drivers with resting time indicated to be parking buses during resting time.

90% bus owners tends to decide the route but only 10% implies that route of the bus decided by the bus drivers

The study revealed that most of the passengers were of the opinion that language used by operatives was not customer friendly. 81.9% of passengers rated operatives’ language as poor or very poor. Only 18.1% of passengers rated the language as good.

Study revealed that buses were overloaded particularly during peak hours. 93.1% of passengers thought that buses were highly overloaded while only 6.59% were of the opinion that buses were moderately loaded.

Apart from bad language and dirtiness of crew, noises from radio and music players was the third ranked nuisance onboard by passengers.
Playing music or radio on a high volume, apart from disturbing passengers lead to misunderstanding and therefore bad relationship between bus crew and passengers

CHALLENGES OBTAINED FROM THE STUDY OF PUBLIC TRANSPORT IN TANZANIA ARE

The study identified challenges at bus stops with a view to assessing whether the existing bus stops were user friendly or not

Challenges

Lack of sheds
Lack of Toilet facilities
Theft
Crowding of Passengers
Touts disturbance

Poor fleet management to the extent that buses are crowded at one point
And creating shortages in other places along the route

Congestion on city roads which impedes smooth flow of buses

Improper design of routes.

Majority of the interviewed passengers expressed their feeling on dissatisfaction
With commuter transport services in Dar es Salaam due to misconducts of bus
Crew. Misconducts reported included: conductors’ abusive language, poor
Hygiene condition of buses, dirtiness of crew uniforms, overloading of buses
During peak hours and music and radio noises due to high tuned volumes. It was
Reported that bus overloading during peak hours led to sexual abuse among
Women.

Regarding urban public transport business profitability, the study established that
Owners with good supervision were getting good returns and therefore managed
To recover investment costs in two to three years for mini buses while large buses took five years.

In route selection, both drivers and bus owners were involved. It was revealed that criteria used in route selection, among others, included: demand status
(availability of passengers), state of road infrastructure, route length, proximity to owners’ premises and owners/crew operational experience in the route

On the other hand, dominance of unprofessional and inexperienced individual operators with inadequate capital in the provision of urban public transport services has a serious negative impact on the industrial growth. Daily employment system propagates workers who do not think in long term and therefore care less about customers. This leads to poor services, increased non compliance and generally consumers’ dissatisfaction.

IMPLICATIONS OF OTHER SOLUTIONS FOF THE PROPLEM OF PUBLIC TRANSPORT IN TANZANIA

a) Effective and coordinated fleet management system;
b) business entities which are not only sound financially but also creditworthy; c) business entities capable of purchase large capacity buses;
d) establishment of demand patterns through ticketing system;
e) allocation of buses in accordance with passenger demand;
f) improved crew welfare;
g) implementation of bus time tables;
h) reliable services;
i) timely market passenger surveys; and
j) improved law enforcement and regulation

An effective sensitization programme be devised to assist individual operators and operatives to shed away misconceptions on advantages and disadvantages of using companies and cooperatives;

Efforts to discourage touts, who apart from adding on operating costs
Harass passengers, be intensified; City and Municipal Councils should improve conditions of roads and expand road network in order to ease congestion and facilitate urban transport business;

Police Force to continue with improving enforcement of law and order especially on road traffic regulations and providing security at bus terminals

SUMATRA, in collaboration with City Council, municipals, TANROADS and Police Force to form a steering committee to provide guidance on route design and bus allocations

Conclusion

The study has established that deliberate measures are needed to improve urban public transport in Dar es Salaam City in order to meet user needs.
The study revealed that the urban transport in the city was still dominated by private individuals operators with used mini buses of carrying capacity between
25 and 34 passengers. Many bus owners had utmost three buses with little experience in the industry of an average of four years. It was revealed that bus owners lacked knowledge and skills in transport management. This attributed to high turn over rate as majority entered the industry as a means of survival instead of going concern. Majority had limited sources of capital such that they depended on personal financing. This negatively affected industrial growth because capital constrains limited their capacity to acquire quality, brand new and large buses.

Regarding mode of operation for urban public transport business, majority of drivers preferred companies or cooperatives to run the business. Drivers were of the opinion that companies could provide better package and working conditions. Moreover, companies could improve discipline and compliance of both drivers and owners with rules and regulations. Individual bus owners, however, were wary of letting the business run by companies or cooperatives.
They feared companies or cooperatives could encourage monopoly, poor management and misappropriation of funds resulting into losses and bankruptcy.

NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF TRANSPORT

MODULE CODE BBU 07212

LECTURER NAME MAUREN KABUGUMILA

TASK INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT

REG NO NIT/BBA/2013/08

NAME KENNETH KAPANGA

QUESTION

Choose any business case study to make market research