Kisumu residents and those living along the proposed Naivasha–Kisumu Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) line have reason to celebrate. This follows Transport and Infrastructure CS James Macharia’s assurance that rail construction was on course.Other Kenyans can also join the celebrations because the benefits will be enjoyed by the entire country. These benefits will be particularly when the railway line is extended to Malaba where it is expected to link up with the one Ugandans plan to build. The SGR line is expected to join the four East African countries of Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and South Sudan whose presidents signed a SGR protocol. The plan is that the line would later be extended to West Africa but with Mombasa-Lamu serving as the entry ports.A cursory calculation of the benefits that Kenya will reap as gateway to such a vast area is what has attracted the attention of global players whose business interests will be disrupted once the project is completed. This is what has attracted criticisms of the Kenyan portion of the SGR project. To be fair to the critics, some of their criticism may be justified. The cost, for example, appears to have been exaggerated when compared to similar projects elsewhere.Contracts signedThe cost of land compensation for the affected individuals is suspect. The finer details of the contracts signed between the lending banks, the contractors and the government may also not pass close scrutiny.These areas will, hopefully, be addressed. The set up of industries that produce export goods meant to boost revenues...

The thing that continues to astonish – in the ongoing Museveni-created hostile relations between Kampala and Kigali – is how up to now so few Ugandans have shown concern for the more than a thousand Rwandans incarcerated in Ugandan prisons, or in the torture dungeons of its security agencies. There have been endless reports of Uganda Police in the border areas, most notoriously in around Kisoro, singling out Rwandans from buses at roadblocks and arresting them on charges of “illegal entry”. There have been equally numerous reports that “illegal entry” is a favorite concocted charge to harass, jail and torture Rwandans. Media has interviewed very many Rwandan victims of Ugandan security forces, when taken into custody on concocted charges. Each and every one of the victims has said even when they showed a valid travel document, Ugandan security agents just confiscate them, and charge the Rwandans with illegal entry! They then take them away to unknown locations, from where, after torture they are transferred to prisons. None other than the Rwandan head of state has said, “If these people have committed crimes, why not try them openly in courts? Why not give the issue transparency?” There have been numerous reports that Uganda’s continued illegal arrests of citizens of a member state of the East African Community violate the protocols that established the EAC Common Market – specifically the laws on freedom of movement of peoples and goods. It has reached a point whereby Rwandan citizens are suing Uganda in the...

The governments of Uganda and Rwanda have been sued over what the civil society described as the “arbitrary closure” of the two neighbouring countries’ common border. The suit was this past week filed at the East African Court of Justice (EACJ) by three civil society organisations – East African sub-regional Support Initiative for the Advancement of Women, Eastern Africa Trade Information and Negotiations Institute (SEATIN-Uganda), and Centre for Food and Adequate Living Rights (CEFROHT). The Gatuna border post was on February 27 closed by Rwandan authorities in the wake of tense relations with Uganda. Rwanda said it shut the border to pave way for construction works on the One Stop Border Post (OSBP). Other border posts remained open but Ugandan goods were locked out of the Rwandan market. In other instances, tariffs on Ugandan goods were raised, making bilateral trade almost impossible. Rwanda President Paul Kagame would later blame the “bad politics” and arrests of Rwandan citizens in Uganda for the border closure. The civil society groups now say Attorney Generals of Uganda and Rwanda have been served the suit to prepare their defence. The activists say the border closure is in “contravention of the Treaty for the establishment of the EAC and Common market Protocol.” At least 400 statements from the affected citizens have since been taken from affected citizens of both countries to support the case. The civil society groups demanded that the EACJ “pronounces itself on the continued impunity and arbitrary closure,” adding, “the court should declare...

Women traders operating between Uganda and Rwanda have sued the two governments seeking compensation for losses they have incurred since the border was closed in February. The suit was filed in the East African Court of Justice (EACJ) in Arusha, Tanzania on June 21 by a consortium of three civil society organisations (CSOs) on behalf of about 600 affected women traders. The CSOs are East African Sub-Regional Initiative for Advancement of Women (EASSI), Southern and Eastern African Trade Information and Negotiations Institute (SEATINI) and Centre for Food and Adequate Living Rights (CEFROTH). They want the court to order the immediate opening of the border, arguing that the reasons for closure are not trade-related. The petitioners argue that the two countries are EAC members who subscribe to the regional Common Market Protocol which should not be violated by political disagreements. “Applicants respectively request court, pursuant of Articles 27 (1), 30 (1) and 38 of the (EAC) Treaty to declare that the act of closing border posts and denying the accessibility of traders and citizens from either state infringed the East African Treaty and violated the provisions of the Treaty and Protocol on the Establishment of the East African Community Common Market,” the suit reads in part. They are also asking the regional court to order a permanent injunction against both countries never to close their border posts and to violate the economic rights of women. They also want an order for an economic and social audit to ascertain the extent of...

Arusha. Finally, the East African Competition Authority (Eaca) has taken off with the finalization of a study on the regional retail sector. Although its permanent seat is yet to be determined, the newest body of the East African Community (EAC) is now fully operational. Findings of the study are meant to develop policy and regulatory instruments that will address challenges faced by various players in the regional retail sector. A source at the EAC secretariat told The Citizen that in order to entrench its activities, a law establishing Eaca would be amended. The EAC Competition (Amendment) Bill, 2019 would address the gaps of the 2006 legislation that established the institution. The Foreign Affairs and EA Cooperation deputy minister Damas Ndumbaro said recently plans are afoot to align the new institution to the broader activities of the EAC. These will include conducting series of awareness workshops for the partner states officials, consumers and members of the business community. The authority is allocated some $ 727,501 for its expenditure during the 2019/2020 financial year which started yesterday. The estimates were approved on Friday by the East African Legislative Assembly (Eala). The total EAC budget tabled was $ 111m. According to Dr. Ndumbaro, major activities to be undertaken by EAC during 2019/2020 fiscal year will include recruitment of the staff. Others are amendments of the organization's regulations 2010 and development of merger and acquisition regulations. Eaca, a new of nearly a dozen institutions under the EAC, has a mandate to promote fair trade...

Implementation of common market protocol EAC and maintaining the fate of our local farmers and business people has become a major challenge to full realization of of the regional integration since the time it came into force in July 1, 2010. The common market has faced this challenge mainly because some members of partner states either do not understand the importance of regional integration or they think that by blocking free movement of people, goods and capital across the borders of partner will spur economic growth. Among the objectives of the Common Market Protocol include acceleration of growth and development among partner states through the attainment of free movement of goods, labour, strengthen coordinate and regulate the economic and trade relations among partner states in order to promote accelerated harmonious and balanced development within the community. All these could be made impossible following stringent rules that partner states are putting in place and the utterances by political leaders from partner states. A good example is the trade dispute between Nairobi and Dar-es-Salaam that led to the arrest of Starehe Member of Parliament Charles Njagua. In defence of Mr. Njagua Majority Leader in the National Assembly Aden Duale also made sentiments that seemed to support what Mr Njagua had said. Mr Duale accused Tanzania of being a stumbling block to regional integration following their move to stop top Kenyan professional Silvia Mulinge from taking up a job in Tanzania. Such perceived differences or suspicions between member states should not be wished...

Agricultural producers in Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa) stand to increase share in the global market, thanks to a project being fast-tracked by the regional bloc to enhance food health standards. Agricultural stakeholders have been calling for the upgrading and accreditation of laboratories for testing agricultural products for export and managing pesticides to enable exporters access global niche market segments. The Comesa secretariat is implementing a project on mainstreaming Sanitary and Phytosanitary Standards (SPS) capacity building into national policy frameworks in five countries. Director of Agriculture and Industry, Thierry Kalonji said most of the regional agricultural products fail to access global market even in terms of premium prices as producers fail to observe outlined standards. Kalonji spoke during a three-day training held in Kenya last week. Health standards During the meeting, experts drawn from agriculture, livestock, and health sectors discussed a framework of identifying and prioritising health standards issues that impede export of agriculture commodities. The framework dubbed Prioritising SPS Investments for Market Access (P-IMA) was designed by the World Trade Organisation Standards and Trade Development Facility. Kalonji said that similar training has been conducted in Uganda and others are lined up for Rwanda, Malawi and Ethiopia, the five participating countries. ”The training is aimed at equipping the institutions dealing with production and export of agriculture and livestock products, with the skills to apply the P-IMA tool to identify SPS priorities that can be mainstreamed into National Planning and Investment Frameworks,” he said. He added: “In general, investments in...

African experts and policymakers on Saturday expressed hope that the African Continental Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement will boost domestic production of pharmaceutical products towards ending over-dependence on imported medicines. The experts and policymakers, who are drawn from Horn of African countries, made the statement during a two-day trade forum on the future of trade as the continental free trade pact took effect, which was held from June 28 to 29 in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa. "The AfCFTA provides an opportunity for economies of scale, lack of which previously hindered African pharmaceuticals production," the experts and policymakers said in a final statement that followed their two-day meeting. Director of Regional Integration and Trade at the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), Stephen Karingi, said during the meeting on Saturday that the regional trade forum, which exclusively focused on the pharmaceutical sector's future prospects under the AfCFTA, urged the introduction of domestic policies that can be used to support the pharmaceutical industry, such as investment assurances, grants, fiscal incentives and local content requirements. "However, we should also look at the issue from a regional perspective," Karingi said, adding "We can have policy space to promote local production, but not to the extent that it prevents the flow of trade." The ECA director also stressed that the African continent has "significant expertise to help build and grow the continent's pharmaceutical industry." "African traditional medicine is an area where there is room for African innovation, but we need to improve on commercialization. This is...

The African Continental Free Trade Area comes into effect on July 7 and it will be a historic day as the continent becomes a single market. The African Union hopes the AfCTA will accelerate continental integration and trade, boost manufacturing and address possible overlaps within trade blocs. This, however, requires members to review import tariffs, striking off import duty from 90 per cent of goods for free access to goods and services across the continent. But, a recent United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (Unctad) report warns that the trade gains may not be evenly distributed among AU member states if proper rules that consider trade patterns, tariff profiles, liberalisation schedules and dependence on tariff revenue are not made. Bottlenecks The AfCFTA implementation team already anticipates bottlenecks based on the existing problems facing intra-African trade in the EAC, the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, the Economic Community of West African States and Southern African Development Community. While presenting The Economic Development in Africa Report, 2019 titled “Rules of Origin for Enhanced Intra-African Trade” in Nairobi last week, Chris Onyango, an expert on international issues, said the way the rules of origin will be created, enforced and verified will determine distribution of economic gains from the AfCFTA and shape future regional value chains. According to the Unctad report, intra-Africa trade was only 15.2 per cent between 2015 to 2017. Growth has been constrained by differences in trade regimes, restrictive Customs procedures, administrative and technical barriers, inadequacies in trade finance, information...

Demographic dividend is a term which is increasingly preoccupying discussions among development economists and the donor community in general in Kenya. The term refers to countries with the greatest demographic opportunity for development and those that are ushering in a period in which the working-age population has good health, quality education, employment and a lower proportion of young dependents. Smaller numbers of children per household generally lead to larger investments per child, freedom for women to enter the workforce and more household savings for old age. African countries are rightly excited about the prospects of reaping a demographic dividend, based largely on their unrivalled potential of a youthful population. However, whether Africa can reap the benefits of a future demographic dividend will depend on how the continent prioritizes Sustainable Development Goal. In Kenya for instance, one study has estimated that the demographic dividend may not happen before 2055. In most African countries, including Kenya, high birth rates are weighing down on economic growth as large numbers of under-15 youths need to be supported by a smaller group of workers. Kenya’s fertility rate stands at 3.7 while a rate of 2.5 or less is required to reach the tipping point where the working-age population surpasses the inactive part. Yet, a high working-age population is not the cure-all; the quality of the work force is even more important and how it meets the demands of the market and fits its wider ecosystem. In my tour of duty, I have over the past...