Narrow-gauge railways in Africa

Narrow-gauge railways are common in Africa, where great distances, challenging terrain and low cost have made the narrow gauges attractive.

Many nations, particularly in Southern Africa, including the extensive South African Railway network (Spoornet), use a 3 ft 6 in (1,067 mm) gauge.

Metre gauge survive in Egypt: in the countryside around Luxor, narrow-gauge railways are used for the transportation of sugar cane.

During the First World War when Cameroon was a German possession, a network of 2 ft (610 mm) gauge Feldbahn railways were built.

After the treaty of Algeciras where the representatives of Great Powers agreed not to build any standard-gauge railway in Morocco until the standard gauge Tangier - Fez Railway being completed, the French had begun to build military 600 mm (1 ft 11+5⁄8 in) gauge lines in their part of Morocco.

In fact, in 1989 the Sishen-Saldanha line set a world record by carrying the biggest train in history, 7.2 km long containing 660 wagons pulled by 15 locomotives and weighing 71,232 tonnes (70,107 long tons; 78,520 short tons), though most trains on this line routinely run with lower tonnage.

[3] In Tunisia, the railway network in the central and southern part of the country is a metre gauge network, including the main lines Tunis-Sfax (Ligne de la Côte) and Tunis-Kasserine, and also the local Ligne du Cap Bon from Bir Bou Rekba to Nabeul.