"My trip to Warsaw will be down to just two hours," Piotr Mazewski,farmer.
Enabling farmers to profit by improving roads
 Piotr Mazewski, a farmer from Kalinowska in eastern Poland, breathes a sigh of relief whenever he takes his goods to market in Warsaw - some 160 kilometers away. Thanks to rapid improvements in Poland’s infamously inadequate road system, over an hour has been saved in his travel time.
Piotr knows that time saved in transportation can make the difference between profit and loss in Poland’s highly competitive agricultural sector, which employs a quarter of the country's population.
Delays in marketing produce now a thing of the past
 The main bottleneck on the Kalinowska-Warsaw route used to be an intersection in a town called Radzymin. Here, the road narrows and on busy days, Mazewski recalls, “traffic would back up for five kilometers or more, adding over an hour to my trip."
"The new Radzymin bypass enables me to go through that area in just a few minutes,” he adds. The bypass was built as part of the World Bank financed Roads II Rehabilitation Project, which aims to improve Poland’s woefully inadequate and dangerous road network.
Quick access to markets essential for modern agriculture
The country’s road infrastructure was not always a problem for young Mazewski but it quickly turned into one when he decided to modernize his farm. Instead of following in his father’s footsteps and breeding pigs for local buyers, Mazewski chose to follow more ecological breeding methods and market his own brand of goods in the capital.
 His ambitions, however, were soon cut short. Roadblocks abounded and Poland’s road network was not - and still isn't -designed for the traffic levels and vehicle types essential for the country's rapidly modernizing economy.
Not only does unreliable infrastructure hinder foreign investment, but accidents due to the dilapidated roads cost the country about 2 percent of its GDP in physical damage, medical costs, and loss of productivity every year.
World Bank helps to further improve Polands roads
The future looks considerably brighter now, thanks to World Bank financing and expertise. The Bank has supported Polish efforts to modernize its roads since 1993 through a pair of loans totaling US$450 million. These paid for the revamping of roads, the construction of the country's longest bridge at Wyszogrod, and several time- and money-saving bypasses.
Mazewski and his peers in business hope that the project continues to make their lives easier. “I am looking forward to other improvements on this national road,” the entrepreneurial farmer says. “A new bridge across the Bug River is being constructed and when that's done, my trip to Warsaw will be down to just two hours, saving me time and turning in a profit.” |
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