Many African countries are growing at a very positive pace though there are still challenges with inclusiveness, this is according to Mina Baliamoune, Professor of Economics at the University of Florida. The comments were made at SWIFT's African Regional Conference in Cape Town. Baliamoune also warned that transformation was a long road but said the right ingredients within the region were there. “Rwanda, Kenya and Ethiopia are also making inroads,” said Baliamoune. “The right policies are in place in most of the countries especially in macro-economic policies. There are a lot of improvements in the continent especially if one looks at the World Bank’s Doing Business Index.” Foreign Direct Investment Baliamoune said infrastructure remained one of the challenges in most countries which discourage not only foreign direct investments but even local investments. “Education with a focus on skills should be one area where most governments should invest and this should be coupled with inclusiveness of groups should be at the centre of the African story,” added Baliamoune. Baliamoune said post-2015; the world will focus on sustainability of the MDGs. “If we transform Agriculture, for me that will be a huge step towards real transformation in the continent. Skills transfer is critical to ensuring real transformation in the continent.” Baliamoune said Africa does not lack ideas, the challenge that remains is capital. 2015, a watershed year for Africa Lyal White from the Gordon Institute of Business Science said structural challenges need to be addressed in the continent. The Gordon Institute of...

The Northern Transport Corridor in East Africa, extending from the port of Mombasa in Kenya and serving the hinterland countries of Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and South Sudan, is the busiest trade and transport corridor in East Africa handling the bulk of the region's regional and international trade. While there have been major improvements in transport infrastructure for the corridor, it still faces challenges of road accidents due to long driving distances. Being a busy transit corridor, it is also prone to externalities and risks such as the spread of HIV/AIDS and other illicit activities. The other major transit corridor in East Africa, the Central Corridor, faces similar challenges. To address these challenges, among others, the countries of the region have adopted the Japanese Michi-no-Eki (Road Side Stations) concept. The Road Side Stations (RSS) will provide four clusters of services: rest space for drivers and passengers alike (hotels, restaurants, recreation); information space (ICT services, banking, money transfer, etc.); specialized services (medical, wellness, counselling, training, safety education, etc.); and linkages into local economies (to support small business development). The study carried out by the Spanish Consulting firm, TYPSA, identified 144 potential RSS sites along the Northern Corridor out of which 67 are deemed viable. The key Northern Corridor road route covers a distance of about 2,000 kilometres from Kenya through Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi. But the Corridor also has extensions to Eastern DRC and South Sudan. Of the 67 RSS's, 22 are in Kenya, 27 in...

East Africa bloc sends delegation to Burundi, seeks to resolve crisis DAR ES SALAAM, May 5 (Xinhua) -- The East African Community (EAC) on Monday sent a delegation of four foreign ministers to Burundi in hope of helping resolve the ongoing political crisis triggered by President Pierre Nkurunziza's bid for a third term, a statement has said. The political crisis in Burundi should be resolved by respecting the country's constitution and electoral laws, the statement quoted Tanzanian President Jayaka Kikwete, who is also chairman of EAC, as saying. "I am also appealing to the international community to save Burundi from degenerating into chaos," he was quoted as saying. Kikwete has sent foreign ministers from Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda to Burundi on a fact finding mission, adding that after the mission completes its task, he will convene an emergency summit of heads of EAS member states to discuss Burundi's political situation. EAC includes Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi. Mindi Kasiga, spokesperson for Tanzania's foreign ministry, said the mission would hold talks with a wide range of political parties in Burundi. Protests have escalated since April 26 -- one day after Nkurunziza was nominated by the ruling CNDD-FDD as its candidate for the June presidential election. The opposition says his re-election bid violates the constitution which only allow the president to be elected to two terms in office. However, the president's supporters say his first term doesn't count as he was appointed by parliament in 2005 after the civil war...

“Trade is the best cure for prejudice. It is an almost general rule that, wherever there is good citizenship, there is trade, and that, wherever there is trade, there is good citizenship.” – French philosopher Montesquieu. VENTURES AFRICA – Philosophically, it could be argued that nations are endowed with different sets of natural resources for the sole purpose of facilitating trade and exchange – if every nation had the exact same resource profile, there’d be no need for any form of exchange. Beyond philosophy, however, the case for boosting global trading has never been louder with the recent growth slowdown in the global economy. A series of analyses from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which has a long history of advocating for more criss-crossing of goods and services, suggest that trading does more than just provide money for nations, it triggers a virtuous cycle that spikes growth and innovation, while reducing poverty. “If you care about growth and innovation; if you care about jobs and the real incomes of the middle-class; if you care about poverty reduction and greater economic fairness; if you do care about all these things, you need to be serious about fostering global trade,” advocates Christine Largarde, the IMF’s Managing Director. Africa has witnessed impressive economic growth in the last decade—fuelled by increased foreign investment inflow and better commodities trading—but a slowdown in the transfer of goods poses a number of setbacks. Africa is expected to suffer a shrunken portfolio of investment inflows should the slowdown...

Plans to initiate a $20 million private sector fund to finance specific integration-related activities are simply the latest in a long series of collaborative ventures between public institutions and private firms. Each of the East African partner states long discovered the value of such partnerships, nurturing them with varying degrees of success. The specific form that the partnership takes has differed from one sector to another and between countries. In education, for instance, private institutions have existed alongside public ones, relieving the pressure on public educational institutions. Private companies have also participated in offering scholarships, sponsoring professorial chairs, providing internships for university students, and other collaborative ventures. In infrastructure, too, partnerships with private companies have led to construction of facilities that would otherwise have been unaffordable using public resources. Generally, some method is agreed upon for the private sector to recover its funds and make a reasonable return, say through the Build, Operate and Transfer model in which the private company would operate a new facility for an agreed period of time. At the regional level, the East African Community has benefitted immensely from co-operation with the business community led by their apex organization, the East African Business Council. Indeed, most regional integration initiatives are geared toward improving the business environment, hence the significant involvement of the private sector. It is upon this foundation of goodwill and existing public-private initiatives that the EAC hopes to build a stronger partnership with the private sector. While the details are not yet public...

KAMPALA,Uganda - Civil society Organisations in Uganda have asked the Ministry of Finance not to amend the Tax Revenue Measures under the Value Added tax amendment Bill 2015 which will see Government exempting Mining companies to pay VAT. The activists also want the Ministry of finance to increase the proposed levy operator’s license fee on bodaboda from the proposed UGX30, 000shillings or USD$6.7dollars by Government to UGX200, 000 Shillings or USD$ 67dollars They said this will enable Uganda Revenue Authority to collect more revenue to finance Government proposed activities in the financial year 2015/2016 and also stream line the industry Business. The Activists under their advocacy group civil society Budget Advocacy Group(CSBAG) told Journalist in Kampala that the proposal to amend section 24 and 25 of the principle of VAT Act is risky and likely to be abused by the Mining Companies and sets a bad precedent for other sectors. “We had the Minister of Finance planning and Economic Development presenting tax revenue measures for th e financial year 2015/2016 to parliament among the proposed tax measure is the exempting of VAT Payment by the Mining Companies. AS civil society we strongly challenge this because it will lead to revenue loss and also lead to other sector to demand the same privileges VAT principles should not be applied selectively” Explained Ms Nelly Busingye Mugisha the programme Office at SEATIN Uganda on behalf of CSBAG during the briefing. In the financial year 2015/2016 Government granted Value Added Tax exemption for companies...

EAST Africa is witnessing a flourishing trade, thanks to heavy investments in trade infrastructure and dismantling of bureaucratic and procedural barriers to economic integration, according to TradeMark Africa. TMA said during the launch of their 2013/14 annual report in Dar es Salaam last week that investments in trade infrastructure as well as the dismantling of bureaucratic and procedural barriers to economic integration were positioning the EAC region as the destination of choice for doing business. It said that encouraging results achieved over the past year, including investments at key ports have resulted in reduced cargo transit times on East Africa’s main transport corridors, and accelerated implementation of the EAC’s Single Customs Territory. The donor funded organisation said harmonisation of product standards had also expanded the East African Community trade basket. The Annual Report details TMA’s vision of enhancing integration in the region through trade and highlighted successful projects which include modernisation and expansion of East Africa’s two main ports of Dar es Salaam and Mombasa. At the Dar es Salaam port, TMA partners with the World Bank and UK’s Department for International Development (DFID) to support a 596 million US dollar grand project to modernise and expand the port with a view to improve operational efficiency. The project, titled Dar es Salaam Maritime Gateway Project, is billed to improve the physical capacity of infrastructure and operational efficiency at the port by demolishing sheds 2 and 3 of the port. The demolition work began last month. In addition, roads leading to...

A declaration by President Pierre Nkurunziza of Burundi that he would run for a third presidential term in next month's elections despite a two-term limitation imposed by the country's constitution threatens to plunge the small land-locked nation into anarchy. Burundians opposed to Mr Nkurunziza running for a third term have taken to the streets of Bujumbura in protest. Seven people have died from the clashes with security officers. The government's reaction to the protests has been to shut down social media, the country's independent media and to declare all demonstrators criminals, terrorists and enemies of the state. Yet what is galling most is the collective silence from Mr Nkurunziza's peers in the East African Community. Of course little would be expected from most of them: not from Uganda's Yoweri Museveni who has twice tinkered with the constitution to extend his term limit; not from Tanzania's Jakaya Kikwete presiding over a hotly contested transitional election; not from Burundi's northern neighbour Rwanda whose President Paul Kagame seems keen on a term extension. It therefore falls on President Uhuru Kenyatta to speak up against what obviously is an attempt to halt the march of democracy in the region. Predictably, the incumbent could be tempted to exploit the line that he needs to stay on to hold the country of two tribes (Hutu and Tutsi) together. That doesn't wash any more. A former Belgian colony, Burundi has been under the spell of a civil war for most of its independence history. The election of...

Kenya risks losing track of the movement of goods and massive clearance levies if the new multibillion-shilling integrated customs management system, which is in the process of being awarded by the Kenya Revenue Authority, is not aligned with the regional codification practices which are fully supported by dependent customs management systems. All the East African Community countries, except Kenya, are already using the Automated System for Customs Data, which predisposes Kenya to implement a system that can seamlessly interface with Asycuda to fully monitor movement of goods and cross border transactions. "The government has already sought bids for the provision of an automated customs management system from interested suppliers. It has forecasted 2015 as the year when the new system will be piloted. Although the change to an integrated custom management system would be costly to the government, the benefits derived from the EAC integration will supersede the expenses and eventually be worthwhile for both the government and individual traders," a report, Tax Matters, by Pricewater House Coopers released in June last year says. With the current single customs territory, Asycuda users from Uganda and Rwanda are clearing goods before their arrival in Mombasa. Other EAC revenue authorities monitor the arrival of goods from Mombasa using the transit facility of Asycuda up to their border with Kenya. Nonetheless, transit of goods across Kenya is very well-monitored, but by other EAC revenue authorities. What the Kenya Revenue Authority needs is a system which is able to exchange customs declaration information with...

Arusha. A partner state that will not attend key meetings of the East African Community (EAC) without any sound reason will now face the music, it was resolved here at the weekend. A partner country to EAC is now required to give a seven-day notice in the event it won’t be able to participate in the meeting in question. “In the event that a seven-day notice is not given and other partner states are already at the venue of the meeting, the session shall proceed and deliberations and outcome of the meeting and decision reached shall bind the absent member country,” the secretariat said yesterday. The new directive focuses mainly on the Sectoral Council Meetings of the regional organization where important issues for each sector are discussed by senior officials and technical experts from the partner states. It is at the level of the Sectoral Councils where comprehensive implementation programmes for each sector covering the region are prepared as well as setting out the priorities Sectoral Councils, through their respective committees, also monitors and keeps under constant review the implementtion of the programmes of the Community with respect to its sector. Following the just-ended meeting of the EAC Council of Ministers here, the Arusha-based Secretariat was directed to report on the absenteeism of the partner states from sectoral council meetings for action. The ministerial council, which is the policy organ of the Community, directed the secretary general to officially communicate to partner states challenges faced due to postponements of meetings....