Zambia, Africa’s top copper producer plans to upgrade their infrastructure over the next five years by building new roads.

According to President Michael Sata’s spokesman, George Chellah, the initial phase of the project will see 2300 km of roads being built at a cost of $1.6 billion.

“The launch of this project signals the beginning of the revolution to modernise Zambia,” Chellah said.

Just over 3000 km of roads will be built in the second phase and 2 862 km of roads will be constructed in the third phase.

According to the US Central Intelligence Agency’s World Factbook, the majority of roads in the country are unpaved with about 20 000 km of paved roads and 71 000 km of unpaved roads.