The Northern Corridor, connecting EastAfrica to the World through the port of Mombasa, is one ofthe oldest corridor authorities in Africa, as it wasestablished in 1985. Throughout its years of existence, ithas been a source of ideas and knowledge that contributed tothe thinking on trade facilitation. To a large extent, it isthe birthplace of the concept of corridor transportobservatory, and through successive models and revisions, ithelped shape what transport observatories are. TransportObservatories emerged as the result of the efforts made overthe years to address the specific challenges faced bylandlocked developing countries. Most of these countriesrely heavily on overseas markets as outlets for theirproductions and as source for their imports, but for that,they must transit through a coastal country. They are at adisadvantage when it comes to competing on equal terms withother economies for integrating into the world market. Thehandicaps attached to that remoteness are well known andmany: a longer time to import or export, a time rarelypredictable, higher costs, with sometimes a double toll wheninput into production must also be imported. Moreover,little can be done by the landlocked countries alone toimprove the conditions of crossing transit countries.Indeed, transit trade flows may even be considered as anuisance or even a threat when similar economies arecompeting for similar markets.
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