With the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) set to officially start operating from July next year, there is need for concerted efforts to enlarge the group of State parties under the agreement in excess of the current 28 countries that have so far deposited instruments of ratification. Enlarging the group will see the continent creating a much bigger market that will ensure intra-African trade delivers, in particular by contributing to the continent's industrialisation and structural transformation processes thereby creating more job opportunities and reducing poverty along the way. This was said Tuesday by Stephen Karingi, Director of the ECA's Regional Integration and Trade Division, at the ongoing 23rd Meeting of the Intergovernmental Committee of Senior Officials and Experts (ICSOE) for Eastern Africa in Asmara, Eritrea. "To operationalize the AfCFTA, we need to finalize the remaining critical components like goods schedules and rules of origin. We also need to enlarge the group of State parties and to create institutions, establish operative mechanisms, and introduce obligations into law and regulation to effectively implement the AfCFTA," said Mr. Karingi. He said Africa also needs to take complementary measures to maximize benefits, in particular following AfCFTA national strategies; conclude Phase II negotiations, especially competition policy, intellectual property rights, and investment, and use the AfCFTA as a vehicle for achieving the African single market. Mr. Karingi said following the implementation of the AfCFTA, based on the sole reduction of tariffs on goods, Africa's GDP would increase under all scenarios. In preparation for July 2020,...

Kenya’s new Sh350 million world-class cruise ship terminal will be commissioned next month during the tourist arrivals peak season when luxury ships are expected to dock at Mombasa port. The terminal is expected to create 300 jobs directly, boosting local industries such as the transport sector, hotels, food providers and curio sellers. In an interview last week, Tourism and Wildlife Secretary Najib Balala, said the completion of the terminal —which is being constructed using a Sh250 million funding from the Kenya Ports Authority (KPA) and another Sh100 million from Trade Mark East Africa (TMA) — will give a much-needed lift to the sector’s fortunes. Industry players are now gearing up for the cruise ship peak season which is set to bring good tidings to the country as the construction of the cruise terminal at the port currently stands at 95 percent complete. On Sunday, the Port of Mombasa received MS Albatros, the first cruise vessel for the season carrying 446 passengers and 346 crew members. It was sailing from Zanzibar. While in Mombasa, the tourists toured the city, Maasai Mara, Tsavo National Park and Shimba hills. The new terminal includes duty -free shops, restaurants, conference facilities and offices for key stakeholders in the industry. The practical handover expected to take place in the next two weeks. The completion comes in time for the cruise tourism during the festive December period. “We are pleased to have this call from Ms Albatros; it is the first passenger cruise ship of 2019 docking...

The east Africa region, the fastest growing sub region on African continent, needs to implement the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement to create jobs for 8.5 million youth in the sub region entering the job markets every year. “The struggles that we see today in terms of achieving growth and creating jobs for our youth could be something of the past if we actually work together to exploits the benefits of the free trade area agreement,” said Vera Songwe, UNECA Executive Director of UNECA. She made the statement this morning in Asmara, Eritrea addressing the 23rd meeting of the Intergovernmental Committee of Senior Officials and Experts (ICSOE). “We know because of the analysis that we do at the UNECA that the African Continental Free Trade agreement stands to deliver about $1.8 billion worth of additional revenue to the continent ad can create about 2 million jobs a year,” she said. The experts are gathered from the 14 countries found in the east Africa sub region namely, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Kenya, Uganda, South Sudan, Madagascar, Tanzania, Burundi, Comoros, Djibouti, Rwanda, Seychelles and Somalia. The fastest growing The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) predicts that East Africa sub region will grow at 6.5% by 2020. “This is the fastest sub-region on the continent [Africa]. Today this east Africa region is growing at 6.4%. We expect it to grow at 6.5% by 2020. The overall continent is growing at only 3.4%,” she said, in her...

The Inter African Coffee Organisation (IACO) has joined forces with the Centre for Agriculture and Biosciences International (CABI) and the International Coffee Organization (ICO) to launch the Ksh.95 billion ($950 million) ‘Africa Coffee Facility’ (ACF) to boost Africa’s coffee industry and achieve a 40 percent increase in high-quality exports worth $5 billion a year. The ACF is projected to transform Africa’s coffee production – currently 10 percent of the global coffee market – into a vibrant and resilient industry again. Coffee is a primary source of income for more than 12 million households in Africa and contributes a significant proportion of tax income in a number of these countries. The largest annual export value of African countries is recorded by Ethiopia at $762.8m annually, followed by Uganda ($468.4m), Kenya ($229.5m) and Tanzania ($129.2m). Speaking at the event, Agriculture Cabinet Secretary Mwangi Kiunjuri said, “We need to build the capacity of our smallholder producers as well as revamp our producer organizations, empower women and the youth through entrepreneurship development. This includes a value chain transformation from a subsistence to an entrepreneurial orientation among our farmers.” This year the Government of Kenya allocated 3 billion Kenya Shillings (equivalent to USD 30 million) towards supporting coffee producers. Dr. Fred Kawuma, Secretary General of the IACO, said, “Africa produces some of the highest-quality and much-loved coffee in the world but its contribution to the global coffee trade has declined significantly since the 1970s when nearly a third of all coffee was produced on the continent.”...

IN implementing its ambitious massive investment development plan, the Tanzania Port Authority (TPA) through its Tanga office has officially started renovating and upgrading Tanga Port by dredging the entrance channel and the berth. The improvement at Tanga Port aims at turning the gateway into the highly competitive terminal, serving customers in the country, East African region and great Lakes region as the plan now is to have a 12-metre depth berth from the current five metres. Future plans will also involve construction of a passenger terminal and a modern Single Mooring Point (SPM) for oil cargo. Speaking to reporters in Tanga on Sunday after a board meeting, TPA Board Chairperson, Prof Ignas Rubaratuka and TPA Director General Deusdedit Kakoko said Tanga Port is a strategic terminal for the country's economy. China Harbour Engineering Company (CHEC) is implementing the project whose first phase that costs 170bn/- is expected to last for 12 months. Project implementation kicked off on October 04, 2019. According to Prof Rutabaruka, currently the terminal does not accommodate mega cargo ships as the entrance channel and the berth are shallow, a factor that compels cargo ships to anchor about 1.7 kilometres away (outer anchorage) from the berth. "Outer anchorage has so many disadvantages as it increases TPA's operational costs,a burden which is sometimes passed on to traders and later consumers," he said. From the outer anchorage, he said, cargo is then brought to the berth by budges and tug boats, spending much time handling a single cargo, including...

Tourism may be international or within the traveler's country. The World Tourism Organization defines tourism more generally, in terms which go "beyond the common perception of tourism as being limited to holiday activity only", as people "traveling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for not more than one consecutive year for leisure and not less than 24 hours, business and other purposes". Tourism can be domestic or international, and international tourism has both incoming and outgoing implications on a country's balance of payments. Tourism suffered as a result of a strong economic slowdown of the late-2000s recession, between the second half of 2008 and the end of 2009, and the outbreak of the H1N1 influenza virus, but slowly recovered. International tourism receipts (the travel item in the balance of payments) grew to US$1.03 trillion (€740 billion) in 2005, corresponding to an increase in real terms of 3.8 pc from 2010. International tourist arrivals surpassed the milestone of 1 billion tourists globally for the first time in 2012, emerging markets such as China, Russia, and Brazil had significantly increased their spending over the previous decade. The ITB Berlin is the world's leading tourism trade fair. Global tourism accounts for ca. 8 pc of global greenhouse gas emissions. The word tourist was used in 1772 and tourism in 1811.[12] It is formed from the word tour, which is derived from Old English turian, from Old French torner, from Latin tornare; 'to turn on a lathe,' which is itself from...

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Burundi has joined a group of nine African countries at a high risk of debt distress while Kenya’s risk of default has increased to moderate from low. This has seen the International Monetary Fund raise a red flag over the rate at which East African countries are accumulating debt. The region’s economies have fallen into a financial fix as they attempt to fund persistent budget deficits and implement mega infrastructure projects against a backdrop of declining revenue collection. As a result, the economies have resorted to massive borrowing, both from the domestic and international markets to quench their loan appetite, with fears that the increasing uptake of commercial loans could push most of them into debt distress. “An over-reliance on commercial public debt exposes sovereign balance sheets to greater rollover and exchange rate risks. Also, an increase in debt from domestic creditors could crowd out financing for private sector projects,” said the IMF. So far Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania are among the top 50 countries in the world that are highly indebted to China, according to US-based research firm Brookings Institution. According to Brookings, countries are now shifting away from official multilateral creditors who come with stringent conditions to non-concessional, (commercial) debt with relatively higher interest rates and lower maturities. But this trend is raising concerns around debt sustainability given the possibility of higher refinancing risks and foreign exchange risks. The IMF, in its regional economic outlook report for sub-Saharan Africa released last week, says that surging public debt-to-GDP ratios...

Tanzania is unlikely to meet the November deadline for the first phase of the 300km-long $1.9 billion standard gauge railway being built between Dar es Salaam and Morogoro. Sources from the Tanzania Railways Corporation told The EastAfrican that the current short rains have slowed laying of the tracks on concrete sleepers along the line. The rains have also paralysed drilling works at a hill where a tunnel needs to pass through as well as building of bridges, which have to be constructed in dry weather. Jamila Mbarouk of TRC said despite a slow down in construction, the SGR project is at an advanced stage. She said construction at various sites has reached 70 per cent. The contractors, Turkish firm Yapi Merkezi, in partnership with Portuguese firm Mota-Engil Africa have completed a stretch of 210 kilometres and are finalising works on the main stations. She said the first phase has six main stations at Dar es Salaam, Pugu, Soga, Ruvu, Ngerengere and finally Morogoro. The Dar es Salaam and Morogoro stations will be the biggest. Source: The East African

CONSTRUCTION of the new berth and the cargo yard at Mtwara port is on the right course and the new cargo terminal is expected to be completed next March, the port management in the southern region has confidently stated. Briefing reporters who toured the port recently to witness the implementation of various development projects being carried out by Tanzania Ports Authority (TPA) along the Indian Ocean shoreline, Mtwara Port Manager, Engineer Juma Kijavara, said the constructionproject is currently at 55 per cent of implementation. He said the new berth with a length of 300 metres and 13.5-metre depth (draft) will have the capacity to accommodate mega cargo ships weighing 65,000tonnes. Currently, the port accom modates cargo ships with 40,000 tonnes ( Dead Weight –DWT). All the necessary state -of -the art cargo handling equipment, including modern mobile cranes and other heavy lifting machines, will be availed at the port upon completion. The construction of the new multipurpose terminal is being implemented through a joint venture of two Chinese firms- M/S China Railway Construction Engineering Group( CRCEG) and China Railway Major Bridge Engineering Group ( CRMBEG) - at the tune of 137bn/-. According to Engineer Kijavara, the modern multipurpose cargo terminal will be capable of delivering quality services to the southern regions(Lindi, Mtwara and Ruvuma) but with specific focus on serving the neighbouring countries in the southern African region - Mozambique, Malawi and Zambia. However, he said, the government’s future plan on Mtwara Port is to have four berths. “The old...