Focus on one agenda may make Uhuru’s miracle

Laikipia Governor Ndiritu Muriithi (right) admires a locally-made tuk tuk, in Nyahururu on June7, 2019. The government is a key driver of revenues for the manufacturing sector. PHOTO | STEVE NJUGUNA | NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • Aquaculture is a sector within the blue economy that holds immense promise, which, with just a little nudge, will yield tremendous rewards.
  • President Kenyatta can make at least one miracle happen, but he must wake up and kick some backsides at the Presidential Delivery Unit.

Barring a miracle, President Uhuru Kenyatta’s government will not achieve any of his stated four legacy objectives before he leaves in 2022.

They may be based on rigorous strategy formulation but execution of the enabling policy is shaky and anaemic.

Take the objective of creating one million jobs in the manufacturing sector, raising its contribution to GDP from 8.5 per cent to 15 per cent, increasing foreign direct investments five times from $672 million (Ksh68 billion) in 2017 to $3.8 billion and improving its ease of doing business to join the top 50 ranking from the current 61 (this should happen as it is simply eliminating regulatory obstacles on paper).

The first challenge around this objective is to base its success on manufacturing, understood to mean mass production of products and commodities in the traditional factory setting that deploys heavy machinery and shop floor production methods.

While this is fine theory, the reality is different. Many manufacturing companies are currently intensely researching, testing and applying production methods that are less labour intensive simply because labour is a huge cost factor.

MANUFACTURING

The second challenge is the time context. The government is a key driver of revenues for the manufacturing sector because it is a key consumer of goods and services.

Its insatiable appetite for debt to service capital intensive infrastructural investments (and yes, corruption!) has left little cash to pay for goods and services being produced locally and squeezed many manufacturing enterprises into painful restructuring or closure.

This has spawned the irony that has seen thousands of jobs lost over the past three years when the economy should be gathering momentum to deliver on the legacy agenda item.

The third challenge is one of implementation. The two areas that offer the best promise to deliver on the objective are the ones least supported – the textiles and apparel sector and the blue economy.

The textiles and apparel sector was worth close to $790 billion globally in 2018 out of which the US accounts about $91 billion.

Kenya’s exports in this sector is a paltry $398 million, employing about 52,000 directly.

TEXTILE

These figures are significant because Kenya is a key beneficiary of the African Growth and Opportunity Act promulgated in 2000 in the US to spur growth of industries in sub-Saharan African by providing duty free access to the US market.

The textile and apparel sector is a key target for this because of the huge apparel market in the US.

Although it triggered some growth, the opportunity for Kenya, given its favourable (labour, infrastructure, accessibility) attributes were and remain vast.

The AGOA opportunity window closes in 2025, so time is fast shrinking for Kenya to take the opportunity.

Even if the country did not revive the cotton production industry, it can import yarn from neighbouring countries (Uganda has excellent yarn) and produce apparel in Special Economic Zones that can provide gainful employment to hundreds of thousands of Kenyans, particularly women and youth.

JOBS

Ethiopia has done it and it is now offering best-in-class lessons on how to set up SEZs that work in this sector.

In a short span of time, the textile and apparel sector employs more than 60,000 people and it is growing. In Kenya, a strategy developed in 2014 is yet to be fully implemented.

Aquaculture is a sector within the blue economy that holds immense promise, which, with just a little nudge, will yield tremendous rewards.

Msingi East Africa, a not-for-profit development organisation, is dedicated to supporting industries that have the potential to transform the lives of the people through employment and wealth creation, and it is currently working in both the textile and apparel sector and aquaculture.

Its studies show that the biggest drawback in this sector, like in many others, is uncoordinated initiatives and lack of focus.

Again, it is not lack of information or knowledge of what needs to be done, it is the abysmal lack of single-minded focus and prioritisation.

President Kenyatta can make at least one miracle happen, but he must wake up and kick some backsides at the Presidential Delivery Unit.

Mr Mshindi is former editor-in-chief of Nation Media Group and is now consulting; [email protected]