Following the successful completion of the Trans-Gambia Corridor Project in the Lower River Region, the National Roads Authority (NRA) on Tuesday kick-offs a two-day training of new enumerators that are going to carry out the data collection activities on the bridge as part of the monitoring and evaluation component of the project.

This training, which gathered twenty (20) participants from the NRA is currently ongoing at a local hotel in Bijilo.

The training aims at collecting data to be used for the impact analysis of the construction of the Sene-Gambia Bridge on communities surrounding it and beyond.

Speaking during the opening session, Mr Ousman Sanyang, Managing Director of the National Roads Authority (NRA), stated that training sessions are generally worthwhile for the acquisition of valuable skills for future use. He added that the importance of this study, which will result in a monitoring and evaluation report, is to measure the impact of the Trans-Gambia Bridge project following its successful completion and operation to date. This, he added, will give justification for the funding agencies in terms of putting their money in the right place and also assure the country that the provision of transport infrastructure improves life and livelihood.

According to him, this training for the Sene-Gambia Bridge is quite timely for the NRA as there would be a similar training for the Bertil Harding Highway following final completion.

For his part, Bai Bittaye, Director of Human Resource and Admin, National Roads Authority (NRA), stated that this training for data collection and recording on the Sene-Gambia Bridge is very timely and strongly encourages the participants to make the best use of the opportunity.

He told participants that, such trainings are hands-on skills that they will acquire as part of their skills development and equally advise them to be interactive and ask questions of the trainer to acquire necessary knowledge and skills.

Lamin Bojang, Coordinator of the Trans-Gambia Bridge project said this training is for the enumerators who are going to carry out the data collection surveys on the ground, adding that they are going to work on three sites.

“The project site proper is the Trans-Gambia Crossing and its surroundings. One of the control sites, Banjul Barra, for traffic comparison was done during the baseline study. Household surveys for socio-economic comparison will be carried out in Soma and Farafenni, where Janjanbureh will be used as a control site.” He revealed.