As the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) is still battling with teething problems of its age long pet project of single currency,  the Africa Union (AU) may have seized the initiative to launch common monetary policy and single currency to accelerate economic integration of African countries. According to Ms Naglaa Nozahie, a Special Advisor to the Governor of the Central Bank of Egypt, who represented the Association of African Central Banks (AACB) at the third session of the Specialised Technical Committee of the African Union (AU) on Finance, Monetary Affairs, Economic Planning and Integration in Yaounde, Cameroon last week, the initiative is to culminate in the establishment of the African Central Bank (ACB) by AU in 2045. Late last year, the Africa Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) said, at the Intra Africa Trade Fair (IATF)in Egypt that it was working on an arrangement that would enable countries trade and settle transactions costs without reference to external currencies. According to its Director of Corporate Communications, Mr Obi Emekekwue, Afreximbank is already working on the scheme that would enable African countries trade among one another without resorting to other convertible currencies like the dollar, pound sterling, euro and the Chinese renminbi. He disclosed that the bank had already commenced a test run of the scheme, which would be launched across the continent soon. The lack of such deal to facilitate urgent settlement of trade mighteventually truncate the dream of a common market under the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) regime, according to the...

The Addis Ababa Chamber of Commerce says it is looking forward to revitalize trade relations between Ghana and Ethiopia as two countries who have historically engaged in commercial partnerships. The President of the Addis Ababa Chamber of Commerce, Mesenbet Shenkute said this when she led a delegation to the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority ahead of a trade facilitation conference in Addis Ababa. According to her, the Ethio-Ghana International Conference on Trade and Finance, will give the opportunity for African countries to evaluate areas within the trade and logistics sector to take advantage of and maximise its full potential. “With this conference a number of thoughts will be discussed, one of which is how African countries can work together to facilitate trade and we will also discuss on finance as well. So this is a very good opportunity for Ethiopia and Ghana. You are in the West and we are in the East, no matter what we have to start very good relationship with Ghana where we had long time standing relationship during those periods. So we came here to make you aware that we are going to have this conference and hopefully you will also join us,” she said. She said, the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority is pivotal in international trade, hence, their reasons for exploring opportunities of partnership. “This is a very essential area whereby if we are going to start import and export trade this port will be essential to facilitate trade relationship between the two...

Kenya’s economic development has gathered momentum with the execution of the ‘Big Four Agenda’. The country has transformed its infrastructure, which includes completion of the standard gauge railway (SGR), construction of rural roads and modernisation of the ports and the northern corridor, opening it up to the region. The counties have already embraced the Big Four, with the recent 2019 Devolution Conference focusing on contribution to acceleration of the pace of its realisation. PRODUCTIVITY The Big Four guarantees Kenya a healthy, food-secure, well-housed and, therefore, working nation with improved value addition and manufacturing aimed at enhancing exports to spur foreign exchange harvesting. Countries that have transformed their economies could differ in all other aspects but agree on the need to progress by the citizens becoming deliberate active participants in national development. The Big Four seeks to transform manufacturing to 15 per cent share of the gross domestic product (GDP). The achievement of this enormous target will require increased output from Sh650 billion to Sh2.2 billion by 2022. This will be supported by improvement of the healthcare systems with universal coverage, development of affordable housing and ensuring agricultural productivity is enhanced to guarantee all Kenyans the required basic needs for sustainable living. Such a nation will enhance its brand, become more visible and attract investments owing to higher quality of life and purchasing power — a prerequisite for the manufacturing target. Realisation of the Big Four economic blue print will require a change of our economic structure to focus on outward...

He said that the good relationship that exists between the two countries can be made better and more beneficial through people-to-people interactions. “The relationship between our two countries is probably the best,” President Kenyatta said. “The more we meet, the more we interact, the better we integrate as a people,” he added. President Kenyatta spoke on Monday at the Rwanda Defence Forces (RDF) Combat Training Centre in Gabiro where he addressed over five hundred top government and private sector officials who are attending the national leadership retreat. The national leadership retreat is held annually and brings together leaders from all sectors of the Rwandan economy to discuss development programmes. The President, who was on a short visit to Rwanda, said he was impressed by the national leadership retreat concept and promised to consider replicating it in Kenya. While citing Rwanda’s top ranking in the World Bank’s ease of doing business index, he noted that the country, under President Kagame had risen from the devastation of war into a robust economy and a model of progress in Africa. “I am proud of how Rwanda has emerged from the challenges of its past into a model economy. Rwanda is one of Africa’s shining stars,” he said. The President, who earlier held private talks with his host, said that Kenya and Rwanda have been able to achieve a lot together in recent years and challenged the people of the two sister countries to engage more. “As governments, we have been able to achieve...

TPA Director General Deusdedit Kakoko told The Guardian in an interview yesterday that the move has been necessitated by the need to control the flow of goods in and outside the country as well as checking landing of undocumented persons. TPA is finalising the process of dumb ports formalisation in the midst of objections from various quarters in the government, backed by surveys conducted by TPA in collaboration with other public agencies which identified hundreds of porous entry and exit points. “The 150 points of entry meet the criteria for formalisation. Customs officials will be deployed there to control entry and exit of people and goods as well as collect government revenue,” he asserted. Currently port managers for lake and sea ports are finalizing the submission of names of dumb port locations for the same to be presented to ministerial authorities for approval. Items shipped in through dumb or unrecognized entry points include sugar, cooking oil, cement, timber, as well as facilitating the export of crops and minerals, operations which upset revenue projections and disturb the market by landing untaxed goods, sold at significantly lower prices. Stakeholders say illegal entry points contribute to the killing of local industries owing to dumping of merchandise from near and far, thus the resistance to formalise many illegal points of entry. Kakoko said that TPA had already identified most formalization potential entry points, and met with stakeholders including district council officials in respective areas before pursuing the final formalization procedures. “Port managers in respective...

Kenya earned nearly Sh10.33 billion from the standard gauge railway (SGR) in the first full year of operations, signalling that the mega project will take longer to break even. Freight services, which started in January 2018, generated nearly $86.32 million (Sh8.72 billion under) in the year to December, data from the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) indicate. The data shows China Communications Construction Company, the operator, sold slightly more than 1.66 million tickets, earning Sh1.61 billion in revenue during the year. The revenues were not enough to meet the operation costs, which were earlier estimated at Sh1 billion a month or Sh12 billion a year. This prompted an increase in freight charges this year and decisions to increase in passenger fares for children on trains from Mombasa to Nairobi by 100 per cent in a bid to raise more revenue to pay the Chinese operator. The SGR line has struggled to attract adequate cargo volumes with investors balking at the tariffs to transport goods from the Port of Mombasa to the Inland Container Depot (ICD) in Nairobi. The freight services formed the main economic justification for the $3.2 billion (Sh323.20 billion) President Uhuru Kenyatta’s administration pumped into the project through loans largely procured from Exim Bank of China from May 2014. Some 5,039,988 tonnes were ferried from Mombasa to Nairobi between January and December 2018, the KNBS data shows, with a tonne costing $ 17.13 (Sh1,707). Kenya requires additional cash from the railway business to ease the taxpayers’ burden...

IN SUMMARY The souring of relations between the two neighbours has been simmering for years now, and worsened last week when Rwanda closed the Gatuna border post. The planned SGR line linking Mombasa to landlocked Uganda and Rwanda has lagged behind schedule, largely due to financing constraints, doubts over its economic viability, and the high cost of construction and indecisiveness of some partner states. Rwandan officials met their Tanzanian counterparts for discussions on reinforcing trade and collaboration between the two countries. The East African learned that no agreements were signed. In view of the recent developments, President Kagame would be anxious to get this project done soon to clear the logistical nightmare that would arise were Uganda to block goods destined for Rwanda from passing through its territory. Rwandan President Paul Kagame was in Tanzania this past week on a two-day visit, seen as a quest to firm up relations with Dar in the wake of escalating tensions with Uganda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo. President Kagame, who arrived in Dar es Salaam on Thursday, held private talks with President John Magufuli, in what is perceived as a quest to have the Tanzanian leader mediate in the security and commercial dispute between Kampala and Kigali. The souring of relations between the two neighbours has been simmering for years now, and worsened last week when Rwanda closed the Gatuna border post. In recent weeks, Kigali has complained that Uganda has been subjecting its citizens to illegal arrests and torture. Kampala had...

Construction works of phase 2 of Dongo Kundu Southern Bypass in Kenya is set to commence soon. This is according to the Kenya National Highways Authority (KeNHA). Kenha Director-General Peter Mundinia who announced the reports said that they have awarded Japanese consortium Fujita Corporation/Mitsubishi Corporation to undertake US $240m project. Dongo Kundu bypass The 8.96km dual carriageway project will include installation of two bridges one at Mteza and the other at Mwache spanning more than two kilometres and 680 meters respectively. Construction was set to begin August last year but delays from the Attorney General’s office in offering clearance certificates made it impossible for works to start. “We have scheduled the project to begin in April. The contract has been awarded to the consortium and its construction will take 48 months. Comparing to other bridges, this one is bigger than Nyali (390m) and Kilifi (420m). Mteza bridge length is seven times longer than that of Nyali and Kilifi, and it will reduce cost and time used to crossover to and from the South Coast. It will serve Dongo Kundu Special Economic Zone and will boost trade and tourism,” said  Peter Mundinia. “A huge project like that has to pass through the Attorney-General to assess the issue of taxation and agreements. It was not an actual delay, but it was issues to do with checking of the contract and other government processes that had to be done,” he added. Phase one of the project was done by China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation at a cost of US...

As the world marked International Women’s Day last Friday, it was gratifying to see the debate on gender equality evolving to one that seeks to level the field for both genders so there is fair consideration of aspirations, rights, responsibilities and opportunities; hence, this year’s theme – Balance for Better. This theme was arrived at on the basis that everyone has a part to play, and, from grassroots activism to global action, we are entering an exciting period of history where the world expects balance as the critical driver for a better working world. Gender balance means men and women are availed equal opportunities and are judged on their talents and abilities. In the words of the World Economic Forum’s founder and chairman Klaus Schwab, talent is one of the most essential factors for growth and competitiveness. Therefore, to build future economies that are both dynamic and inclusive, we must ensure that everyone has an equal opportunity. As things currently stand, no country has fully closed the gender gap. The most recent survey by the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Index—which examines the gap between men and women in four fundamental pillars of economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, health and survival and political empowerment—estimates that it will take another 100 years to close the overall global gender gap in most countries. Similarly, a report last year by McKinsey titled, Delivering through diversity, reaffirmed the correlation between diversity and company financial performance. The survey, covering 1,000 companies in 12...

Though discussions of African trade during 2018 were dominated by the quest to establish a Continental Free Trade Area, its fruits are unlikely to be realised any time soon. Even if ratified in 2019, its outcomes will take many years to unfold because substantive discussions on rules of origin and tariff lines have yet to happen. By contrast, should the Tripartite Free Trade Area be ratified by the requisite number of countries – as seems possible in the coming months – over 90 per cent of tariff lines have already been agreed, meaning actual implementation would take place in the shorter term. Indeed, combining Comesa, EAC, and SADC means having over half the continent’s nations under one big roof and making TFTA the primary building block of any CFTA. In turn, the creation of TFTA depends heavily on existing procedures and ideas from Comesa. Thus, it would be fair to say that Comesa is a driving force of regional economic integration. Within the bloc, below the ultimate decision-makers – the Comesa Authority and Council of Ministers – is the brains and engine of integration, the Secretariat. For trade matters, it is the Secretariat’s duty to support the drive for higher intra-bloc trade in line with established protocols. And within the Secretariat there is a department that puts this responsibility into practice, an office small in size but large in mandate: the Directorate of Trade and Customs. Given the role of Comesa on the continental stage, it is perhaps the most...