East African Business Notifier

Students from Uganda have made the nation proud by participating and excelling in the recently concluded global Huawei ICT competitions 2025 held in Shenzhen, China.  The global competitions, designed for students and teachers from colleges and universities, attracted over 210,000 students and instructors from more than 2,000 colleges and universities in over 100 countries and regions.  Following national and regional competitions, 179 teams from 48 countries and regions made it to the Global Final. Represented by students from Gulu University, Muni University, Kabale University, Uganda Martyrs University and Cavendish University, the Ugandan contingent demonstrated exceptional determination, skills and innovation securing second prizes in the Cloud Track and the Innovation competitions.   In her remarks,  the Permanent Secretary Ministry of Education and Sport, Dr. Kedrace Turyagenda  who represented the First Lady and Minister of Education Janet Museveni, high...

Connie Hedegaard, Anne Højer Simonsen, Christian Ibsen COPENHAGEN – It has been more than a year since the European Commission proposed the next milestone in the European Union’s transition toward climate neutrality: reducing greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions by 90% by 2040.  But we are still waiting for the proposal to become law, raising concerns that the bloc is focused on more urgent priorities – namely, rebuilding defenses and reviving competitiveness. In fact, building a clean economy would help address the EU’s productivity, innovation, and security gaps.  That is why, despite our varied backgrounds in industry, politics, and think tanks, we collectively urge European policymakers to commit to the ambitious domestic 2040 emissions-reduction target, and to support strategic climate investments and initiatives that will boost Europe’s energy security and competitiveness. As the EU’s  Clean Industrial Deal  has highlighted, climate action is a powerful economic driv...

Hanan Morsy ADDIS ABABA – This year’s spring meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank have made it clear that the global financial system, strained by repeated crises, is no longer fit for purpose.  Growth is decelerating, climate-related volatility is rising, and debt distress is deepening, but the available policy tools remain too cumbersome, fragmented, and inefficient. Africa has long borne the brunt of these failures. But rather than merely calling for reform, African governments are increasingly advancing solutions, building institutions, and introducing innovations to help create an international financial system that allocates capital more efficiently and is equipped to handle escalating shocks and widening inequalities. While calls for reform are often framed as a matter of fairness, the more pressing issue is efficacy. The global financial system fails to provide sufficient liquidity during crises, invest in climate adaptation, channel capital to high-re...

  BY PAUL TENTENA Consumer watchdogs under their umbrella body t he International Consumer Protection and Enforcement Network (ICPEN), a worldwide network of more than 70 consumer protection authorities, have advise d airlines to review their commercial practices and ensure that their environmental claims comply with consumer protection law. The global aviation sector is responsible for an estimated ~3% of the annual net emissions of carbon dioxide produced by human activity, and additional non-C arbondioxide warming effects. ICPEN, in a letter seen by the East African Business Notifier , said they want airlines to raise standards in the way they make environmental claims to ensure that consumers are able to make informed choices based on claims that are accurate and clear, relevant in the context of a product or service, and based on reliable and scientifically-based evidence. “ Giving consumers greater confidence to identify those airlines that they consider to be mak...

Gernot Wagner BRUSSELS – Talk of recession abounds, and it is no secret why. US President Donald Trump’s erratic,  beggar-thy-neighbor policies  have cast a cloud of uncertainty over US and global markets. Making matters worse, some countries were nearing or undergoing a contraction even before Trump returned to the White House. One of the largest is Germany, which has been in a recession for  two years . While there is  no one-size-fits-all cure  for Germany’s malaise, most of the biggest challenges facing the  new government  have a common denominator: a lack of cheap power. The new US energy secretary, Chris Wright (a former fossil-fuel executive), devoted much of his first official speech to  criticizing  Germany’s energy transition ( Energiewende ). As he sees it, Germany was wrong to spend some $500 billion, equivalent to the US spending around $3 trillion, on clean-energy deployment. “Think of how much poorer we would be.” This perspec...

BY EABN CORRESPONDENT For most working Ugandans, the dream of owning a decent home remains just that—a dream. With soaring construction costs, high interest rates, and a complex mortgage application process, many lower-middle-class earners find themselves locked out of the property ladder. Despite the fact that over 60% of Uganda’s urban population resides in informal settlements, the journey to homeownership is often too steep a climb. Now, Stanbic Bank Uganda, the country’s largest commercial lender, is tearing down some of these barriers. In a bold move that aligns with its ambition to become Uganda’s number one private bank by 2028, Stanbic has introduced a preapproved mortgage financing solution that empowers existing clients with up to UGX 500 million—without the need for the traditional loan application process. “Homeownership should not be a privilege for a few—it should be an achievable milestone for every Ugandan who works hard and earns a stable income,” says Damalie Kairumb...