The African continent is set for a major shift in Private Equity investment trends after a major announcement was made in Nairobi this week. During the 16th annual African Private Equity and Venture Capital Association (AVCA) conference, fund managers from around the globe, mainly the US and European markets said they are ready to deploy up to US$1 trillion for investment in the continent. This is through PE funds, a move that now places the continent at a strategic position to tap into the funds for investments in various areas. If tapped by local investment firms, the pool of funds could more than double the number and value of deals reported in the last six years, with regions such as East Africa, West Africa and Sothern Africa reaping big. “It is a plus for Africa,” said Baba Alokolaro, Managing Partner at Nigerian law firm- TNP (The New Practice),“From what we have seen, investors are taking Africa more serious than they had in the past,” Alokolaro who led a team of experts from TNP to the Nairobi event said the continent should angle itself for more deals this year, singling out Kenya as one of the countries set to benefit in East Africa. “We expect to see a lot of deals going forward. In East Africa, Kenya will remain a top investment destination,” he said. AVCA latest data shows the value of reported African PE deals between 2013-2018 was US$25.7 billion, on a total number of 1,022 deals. During the period, total...

Kenya plans to organize a business forum in China in April in order to woo investors into the east African nation, officials said on Thursday. Moses Ikiara, chief executive officer of the Kenya Investment Authority (KenInvest), told Xinhua in Nairobi that the Sino-Kenya business forum will be held on the sidelines of the second Belt and Road Initiative Forum. “The day-long event will bring together Kenya’s government and private sector to meet potential investors from China,” Ikiara said. Ikiara said that Kenya will use the conference to showcase the numerous investment opportunities in Kenya. He added that Kenya has a lot of bankable projects in the manufacturing, energy, health and agricultural sectors. According to KenInvest, the Chinese are now among the top five investors into the country and are concentrated in the construction and manufacturing sectors. “We are especially keen to have the Chinese boost our manufacturing sector through use of modern technology,” Ikiara added. He said that Kenya has signed numerous bilateral and multilateral preferential trade agreements to open up markets for Kenyan goods. “Unfortunately we have not been able to fully exploit these markets as local manufacturers don’t have the capacity to produce for international market,” Ikiara said. He noted that the Chinese could help Kenya become a competitive producer and exports of world class products. Ikiara noted that currently the bilateral trade is in favor of China and thus more investments are needed to ensure Kenya can produce goods that are required in the Chinese market. Source: Doberre

STRATEGIC establishment of more special economic zones (SEZ) will transform and build a strong industrial economy in the region, EPZA Director General, Joseph Simbakalia has said. “Special economic zones contribute significantly to social economic development and rapid industrial upgrade in the country,” he told a delegation from Kimaka Defence College in Uganda that visited the Benjamin William Mkapa Special Economic Zone in Dar es Salaam yesterday. He said in a presentation that the special economic zones also contribute to building up industrial production output with high impact on export trade and employment. He said the EAC regional integration is an important platform that offers huge market opportunity to investors and attract more inflows of investments into the partner states for building strong industrial base. “Establishing more strategic export processing zones in the region with such a bigger market opportunity is vital and can hook more investment to benefit the economies of the partner states,” he noted. He said it was important to invest more on export processing zones to capitalise on the regional geographical advantage of the Indian Ocean mentioned in the recent studies that it will in the future control over 60 per cent of the global trade. He underscored the need of bringing onboard the participation of local private sector in order to achieve industrial sustainability and building inclusive industrial economy. For example, he said the increased manufactured export led products will definitely boost the country’s foreign exchange earnings to benefit the economy as well as making the...

THE government said yesterday is in the process to construct a cruise terminal at the Dar es Salaam port following increasing number of cruise ships calling at the port. The Deputy Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Nature Resources and Tourism, Dr Aloyce Nzuki, announced the plan when receiving Silver Whisper cruise ship that docked at the Dar port yesterday with more than 350 tourists. He said construction of the special terminal would be done during the on-going expansion of the port and new facility would enable handling of tourists without disrupting activities of handling other cargo ships at the port. "Currently the country is not benefiting a lot from the Cruise Ship tourism because the terminal has not been constructed. This limits the number of cruise liners docking at the port," he said. According to him, the cruise ship tourism is common and popular. According to him, companies which arrange cruise ship tourism are ready to bring many tourists to Tanzania but the challenge is lack of a terminal for cruise ships. On his part the Chairman of Tanzania Tourists Board (TTB), Justice Thomas Mihayo said the board would discuss with relevant authorities to see how they could issue long-term visa to tourists who would like to stay in the country for more than a month. The TTB's Managing Director, Devota Mdachi said the arrival of tourists in the country from different markets proves that the country's hospitality, peace and security are satisfactory. She advised the members of the...

Ikigo gishinzwe gutsura ubuziranenge, RSB, cyahawe na Trade Mark East Africa (TMA), miliyoni y’amadolari ya Amerika, ni hafi miliyari y’amanyarwanda agenewe umushinga wo kwita no gukurikirana ubuziranenge ndetse n’ubucuruzi bw’ibiribwa. Aya mazererano hagati ya RSB na TMA yasinywe tariki ya mbere Mata 2019, gusa n’ubwo byanyujijwe muri TMA, amafaranga yatanzwe na USAID. Umuyobozi wa RSB n’uhagarariye TMA mu Rwanda nyuma yo gusinya amasezerano RSB ivuga ko uyu mushinga w’imyaka ine uzagirira akamaro abari mu ruhererekane nyongeragaciro rw’ibiribwa kugirango babashe kugera ku mabwiriza mpuzamahanga y’ubuziranenge, bikarushaho ku bafungurira imiryango ku masoko yo mu karere ndetse na mpuzamahanga. Iyi nkunga kandi izanafasha RSB kunoza imitangire ya serivisi ndetse no gutungaanya integanyabikorwa y’imyaka irindwi. Aya mafaranga ari muri gahunda ya TMA ya miliyoni 50 z’amadorali ya Amerika yemereye Leta y’u Rwanda mu guteza imbere gahunda zirufasha guhangana mu ruhando mpuzamahanga, ku isonga hakaba ibijyanye n’ubuhinzi nka kimwe mu bikorwa by’ubukungu gifatiye runini igihugu n’abagituye dore ko butanga 33% by’ubukungu bw’igihugu, bugakorwa n’abasaga 70% by’abaturage, bityo gutera inkunga ibikorwa by’ubuhinzi bikaba ari ugufasha ibibukomokaho byinshi kugera ku masoko, bigaha benshi akazi kandi bikarwanya ubukene. Nyuma yo gusinya aya masezerano, umuyobozi mukuru wa RSB, Raymond Murenzi yagize ati "RSB ifite ubushake bwo gufasha abikorera kubahiriza amabwiriza y’ubuziranenge no kugeza ibyo bakoze ku masoko yaba ayo mu karere na mpuzamahanga, ubufatanye twagiye tugirana na TMA bwatanze umusaruro mwiza, twishimiye kubuvugurura ngo turusheho kunoza imikorere". Patience Mutesi-Gatera uhagarariye TMA mu Rwanda we yagize ati, “Uko umusaruro ukomeza kwiyongera n’imbogamizi zo kugera ku masoko zigenda zivaho, niko ibijyanye...

Rwanda made the mistake of conflating two unrelated yet sensitive issues when it announced the decision to partially close one border point - the most used - with Uganda and the urging of its nationals against travelling to Uganda due to increased harassment, torture, and illegal detention of its nationals in that country. Since then, it has laboured to explain that all the other borders were open except for the temporary partial closure (for heavy trucks) at Gatuna. This was quickly exploited by the authorities in Uganda, who were gifted with a weapon to use in their pushback against Rwanda’s warning to its citizens. More than anything, Kampala has used it as an irritant against Rwanda, which in-turn has decried the “false equivalence.” However, with the border construction nearing completion – per updates from Gatuna – it will no longer be easy to ignore the issues at hand. Uganda’s eagerness to push on the border issue was intended to neutralise one of Rwanda’s three complaints that include, supporting the Rwanda National Congress (RNC) and the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (better known as FDLR, its French acronym), sabotaging trade by intercepting its goods intended for the Mombasa port or the Kenya market, and the harassment, detention, and torture of Rwandans in Uganda. Clearly, with the border issue, Uganda could counteract Rwanda’s charge against Uganda for its obstruction of the free movement of goods by claiming there is sabotage on “both sides.” Apparently, Uganda was so intent on maximizing...

A meeting between the Kenyan and Somali foreign ministers on Wednesday in Nairobi is paving the way to normalizing the botched relations between the two neighbors, sources said Thursday. A leading Kenyan media sees the move as an attempt by Nairobi to soothe Mogadishu over an alternative means to resolve the dispute that erupted last month over allegations by Kenya that Somalia was undermining its maritime authority. The latest meeting on Wednesday follows a series of others held at the UN since a maritime conflict erupted between the two neighbors slightly over a month ago. The case is presently before the International Court of Justice. Kenya’s Foreign Affairs Cabinet Secretary Monica Juma Wednesday said Kenya’s Ambassador to Somalia Lucas Tumbo and his Somali counterpart to Nairobi Mohamoud Ahmed Nur will be returning to their work stations although she did not give timelines, sources said. “We reaffirmed our strong desire to normalize relations and agreed, as a first step, to have our ambassadors return to station,” Dr. Juma wrote on her Twitter page after the meeting with Mr. Awad in Nairobi. The Daily Nation newspaper in Kenya said the incident had seen Nairobi turning screws on the security front, pulling its troops from the interior of Somalia, where they are part of a regional force -Amisom. It can be recalled that before the latest incident, Somalia has sued Kenya in 2014 at the International Court of Justice, seeking to claim an area about 100km2 in the Indian Ocean by redrawing the...

The shrinking revenue from export of commodities including minerals led to a minor drop in economic growth rates across East Africa in 2018, according to the African Development Bank (AfDB). Growth, however, is expected to gain pace in 2019 at 5.9 percent rising to 6.1 percent in 2020, said a report issued by the bank on Wednesday. The bank's report, measuring economic performance in 13 countries in eastern Africa, shows the real Gross Domestic Product grew by an estimated 5.7 percent in 2018, slightly less than the 5.9 percent in 2017, due to the growing current account deficits caused by low earnings from exports. The bank projects economic growth to remain strong in 2019 at 5.9 percent, supported mainly by domestic consumption of goods and the growth in the services sector. According to Marcellin Ndong-Ntah, AfDB Lead Economist at the regional office in East Africa, the region's fiscal deficit, due to the low earnings from exports caused by the trade imbalance, stood at 30 percent of the national economy, which is considered under control at the moment. However, the bank expressed concern at the growing level of foreign debt accumulation by countries which previously benefited from international debt relief, saying the effect of foreign debts accumulation by the private sector and the public sector would be felt in the near future. The report shows Ethiopia with the highest margin of economic growth at 8.2 percent, followed by Rwanda at 7.8 percent and Kenya at 6 percent economic growth rate. Djibouti...

Over the past three decades, sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) has seen a major restructuring in its trading relationships. Some countries, through regional communities such as the East African Community (EAC) and Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), have deepened trade and economic ties with their neighbors, resulting in faster and more sustained growth. Until the early-1990s, almost 90% of the SSA region’s trading counterparts were extra-regional and predominantly advanced economies, with SSA mainly exporting undiversified primary commodity products and importing consumption and capital goods. Beginning in the early 1990s, trade with advanced economies began declining rapidly and was increasingly replaced with countries in emerging Asia, including but not limited to China. Over the same period, intra-SSA trade also rose sharply and is now at its highest since records began, making the SSA region’s trade with itself the third-most important regional export destination. Despite the increase of recent decades, it is generally accepted that intra-SSA trade is still low and has significant scope for growth. Like SSA, the trading relationships of other developing regions of the world are predominantly outward looking. In 2018, intra-SSA exports accounted for 21% of total exports to the world; in developing Asian countries, that figure was also 21%. But it was lower for countries of the Western hemisphere (16%) and the Middle East and North Africa (14%). Compare this to advanced economies – which trade more with each other – with exports to other advanced economies accounting for 64% of total exports in 2018, whilst imports...

The funds – approved through the Regional Integration Strategy for Eastern Africa (RISP 2018-2022) – will also help enhance regional transport connectivity, regional energy infrastructure, regional information and communications technology connectivity and management of trans-boundary water resources, officials said. The funds will also support projects aimed at accelerating implementation of the regional single market, trade development, including tackling of non-tariff barriers, and putting in place policy frameworks for industrialization and promotion of EAC as a single investment destination. According to AfDB Director General for Eastern Africa Region, Gabriel Negatu, the investment in agriculture and industrialization was crucial for the development of the region. He said the opportunity for industrial growth exists in locally producing inputs for use in the agricultural sector. EAC is still the fastest growing region partly due to solving bottlenecks of communication by investing heavily in infrastructure, Negatu said. The Regional Integration Strategy Paper 2018-2022 maps out the direction of the Bank’s regional integration work in Eastern Africa over the next five years. The key objectives are fast-tracking structural transformation, increasing trade and promoting financial sector integration and inclusion. Source: Green Building Africa