BEIJING, Sept 4 (Reuters) – China, Tanzania and Zambia signed an initial agreement to rehabilitate a decades-old railway aimed at improving the rail-sea transportation in resource-rich East Africa, Chinese state media said on Wednesday.

President Xi Jinping witnessed the signing of the memorandum of understanding on refurbishing the 1,860 kms (1,156 mile) Tanzania-Zambia Railway Authority (TAZARA) railway with the Tanzanian and Zambian presidents, who were in Beijing attending the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, according to the state-run Xinhua news agency.

The single-track TAZARA railway was built between 1970 and 1975 through an interest-free loan from China, offering a cargo transport route from Zambia’s copper and cobalt mines to the sea on Tanzania’s coast that bypasses South Africa and the former state of Rhodesia.

Commercial operations of the line, derided by some Western governments at the time as the “bamboo railway”, began in 1976. The multi-year project had involved the construction of two dozen tunnels and hundreds of bridges by tens of thousands of Chinese and African workers.

“China is willing to take this summit as an opportunity to make new progress in the revitalisation of the Tanzania-Zambia railway, cooperate to improve the rail-sea intermodal transport network in East Africa, and build Tanzania into a demonstration zone for deepening high-quality China-Africa Belt and Road cooperation,” said Xi, according to state media.

Earlier this year, the World Bank approved $270 million in financing to help improve connectivity between neighbours Tanzania and Zambia and boost regional trade.

In February, China proposed to spend $1 billion to rehabilitate the rail line through a public-private partnership model.

(Reporting by Bernard Orr and Ryan Woo; Editing by Kim Coghill and Michael Perry)