US investors eye Kenya market as State progress acknowledged

Kenya is becoming an attractive destination for American companies and investors.

“I’m higher on Kenya than I was a year ago,” president of the Corporate Council on Africa Stephen Hayes said on Thursday following a four-day visit. “I was particularly impressed with what I was hearing from the private sector. Our companies say the situation is improving.”

The corporate council includes nearly 200 US and African businesses. Some of the world’s largest multinationals, such as Microsoft, IBM and Exxon Mobile are involved.

Mr Hayes heads the largest US-Africa business group and said the Kenyan government appears to be making progress in addressing issues of concern to US businesses in the country.

He acknowledged, however, that the country’s security problems are serious and “are not going to go away in the short-term.” But Kenya is not alone in this regard, Mr Hayes added, noting, “in Africa a lot of cultural change is occurring that elicits responses, both negative and positive.”

Although several large US corporations have offices in Kenya, the country is still not widely perceived in US business circles as one of the most advanced in Africa, Mr Hayes said. Nairobi, he noted, has the most developed infrastructure of any African city outside South Africa. He also pointed to innovations such as M-Pesa that have been spawned by Kenyan tech firms.

A trade initiative much touted by the US government during the past decade — the African Growth and Opportunity Act — “has not been important to Kenya” and has proved generally disappointing, Mr Hayes said.

He said it is unlikely that the US Congress will approve a renewal of Agoa this year when it expires in 2015.

Mr Hayes offered a more favourable assessment of two initiatives recently unveiled by President Obama — Power Africa and Trade Africa —both of which could prove important to Kenya. Power Africa seeks to bring electricity to millions of additional African households, while Trade Africa aims to spur commerce among the five countries that belong to the East African Community.

Both these programmes could lead to much greater US corporate activity in Kenya, Mr Hayes said. But, he added, it is not clear how much “financial underpinning” for US private-sector investment will be put in place through Trade Africa.