Kenya invites experts to boost trade

Kenya exports only 10 products to the US under the African Growth And Opportunity Act, while the agreement gives it a 6,700 products market access quota.

This makes the country very vulnerable to market fluctuation and shocks, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Trade, Dr Cyrus Njiru, disclosed on Monday.

Opening a four-day market research and analysis workshop for government trade officers, and public and private marketing agencies involved in exports, the PS said Kenya has a huge trade deficit, standing at $4.9 billion in 2007, up from $1.1billion in 2002.

This has been attributed to the export of raw materials as opposed to value added and finished end products. In order to reverse this trend, the government has invited facilitators from the International Trade Centre, a UN arm, to train and share best practices as regards exports.

Tap opportunities

This new approach involves identifying potential export commodities and how they can be developed to target specific markets. Through this, the country hopes to tap numerous market opportunities across the globe.

“Due to the government’s pursuit of market access strategies, the economy had recorded a 5.7 per cent GDP growth in 2005, 6.4 per cent in 2006 and 7 per cent in 2007,” said the PS.

He said value addition would be the key driver to the Kenya’s future exports adding that tea exports to emerging markets such as Russia had increased over the last three years.

42 participants from private sector agencies such as the Kenya Association of Manufacturers, the Export Promotion Council, the Kenya Flower Council among others are in the workshop.