East African Business Notifier

  Economic Commission for Africa and partners have launched an initiative aimed at strengthening the capacities of city governments in Africa to develop and implement policy reforms and strategies to expand and build resilient urban fiscal space. Referred to as Expanded and resilient urban fiscal space for an inclusive and resilient COVID-19 recovery in Africa-DA-15 Project, the initiative was launched in Nairobi on 22 May, 2024 and is being spearheaded by the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) in collaboration with implementing partners, UN-Habitat and UNCDF, and the Nairobi City County. According to Atkeyelsh Persson, Chief Urbanization and Development Section at the ECA, the project will be implemented in four cities in 2024- Addis, Nairobi, Kigali, and Lusaka. Two more cities -Dar es Salaam and Yaoundé will benefit from the project over the coming three years. She noted that the project will support the selected cities through a chain of interventions, ranging from ge...

  With just over a month to go before the  Africa Hospitality Investment Forum (AHIF)  opens its doors on 25th June, the government of Namibia has confirmed that the President of the Republic of Namibia, H.E. Dr. Nangolo Mbumba will headline the agenda.  AHIF, which is known as the most influential annual gathering of hospitality industry investors, business leaders, government officials, bankers, and expert advisors on the African continent, typically welcomes delegates from over 50 countries for three days of high-level networking, formal business meetings and discussion of the all the latest trends and developments. Hot topics on this year's agenda include Active Development, Financial Institutions, Artificial Intelligence, Authentic Leisure, Aviation Connectivity, Conservation, Demographics, Female Power, Government Initiatives to Support Hospitality, Hotel Development, Hotelification of the Workspace, International and Lifestyle Brands, Investing in Namibia, the...

Climate change continues to ravage Africa, which is enduring extreme weather and natural disasters on an unprecedented scale.  My own country, Kenya, has just emerged from its longest drought on record, only to suffer devastating floods, which have killed   289 people   and affected more than 800,000.  Meanwhile, Malawi, Zambia, and Zimbabwe recently experienced a severe drought that exposed   millions of people   to hunger, and the Sahel region was hit by a debilitating heatwave, resulting in   more than 100 deaths   in Mali. Climate change increasingly drives droughts in Africa, jeopardizing water supplies. It ruins lives and livelihoods, cripples food production, and destroys homes and infrastructure. It affects migration patterns and exacerbates conflicts, forcing entire populations to flee in search of alternative livelihoods for survival. Making matters worse, African countries pay interest rates up to  eight times  higher than tho...

  As digitalization connects the world, cybersecurity is becoming more important than ever before. In the news, we’ve seen an increase in cyberattacks aimed at critical infrastructure such as energy, healthcare, and transportation. These attacks have affected the lives of millions of people around the world. Meanwhile, as a result of the pandemic, people are spending more time online. And many people have  continue d  to work remotely, even after the pandemic. This makes it more important that we do everything possible to ensure a healthy and secure cyber space. In the telecoms sector, industry organizations like GSMA and 3GPP have been working closely with industry stakeholders to promote NESAS Security Assurance Specifications and independent certifications. These baselines have seen wide acceptance in the industry, and they play an important role in the development and verification of secure networks.   However, we still have a lot of work to do. Cybersecurit...

  Liquid Intelligent Technologies a pan-African technology group, has announced a distribution partner agreement (DPA) with Eutelsat Group that will see enterprise-grade Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite services being made available in Africa. Eutelsat Group is the world's first satellite operator with an integrated GEO-LEO infrastructure. “Liquid has always been committed to technological innovation in Africa,” said Ahmed El Beheiry, CEO of Liquid Intelligent Technologies, “Our collaboration with Eutelsat signifies a milestone in bringing cutting-edge LEO services to our customers across multiple countries in Africa, empowering them with high-speed solutions and unlocking new possibilities for connectivity.” “We are thrilled to work with Liquid to introduce new connectivity services throughout Africa. Liquid has a proven track record and a longstanding commitment to connect African businesses. "Working together and leveraging Eutelsat Group’s innovative LEO services, we can un...

Despite aspirational narratives about “Africa Rising,” the continent has yet to achieve the prosperity increasingly found across large swaths of Asia and many other parts of the world.  To attain genuine, inclusive prosperity (beyond aggregate GDP growth), Africa needs stronger trade performance, without which no country or continent has lifted its people out of poverty. Yet Africa’s share of world trade has long been stuck at around  3% . Rather than continuing to depend on “global trade” with advanced industrial economies – a pattern that has kept it poor and undeveloped for the past six decades – Africa needs to build its intra-regional trade.  We can think of this as Africa’s second decolonization. It is a necessary first step toward equipping the continent to engage with the world economy on its own terms. How Africa trades, and what it trades, will determine whether and how fast it can escape from poverty. Most of what we call global trade is, in fact, regional. The...

Oil and gas supermajor TotalEnergies has announced that it will invest $600 million to strengthen exploration and production activities in the Republic of Congo in 2024.  The investment will be used to finance exploration and maintain production in the country’s deep offshore Moho Nord field, which accounts for approximately half of all Congolese oil production, or roughly 140,000 barrels per day (bpd). As the voice of the African energy sector, the African Energy Chamber (AEC) commends the commitment by TotalEnergies to Congo’s oil and gas future. The $600 million investment signals a strong intent by the IOC to develop and monetize Congolese hydrocarbons for the benefit of the country and will unlock a wave of economic opportunities for the broader region.   The TotalEnergies-operated Moho Nord field brings together four reservoirs that extend over 320km 2  in water depths of 750m to 1,200m. As such, TotalEnergies’ commitment to the Republic of Congo’s oil production is...

Ugandans hoping to live under their own roof and end renting have a new opportunity to do so with 100% financing from Stanbic Bank, courtesy of a new lending campaign dubbed “Oli Sorted.”  The 90-day campaign which targets the back-to-school season also enables parents to borrow up to UGX 350 million in unsecured personal loans from Stanbic Bank, to support them pay school fees and other attendant expenses. According to Israel Arinaitwe, the Head of Personal Banking at Stanbic Bank  the campaign is a timely response to address the needs of customers who require financing different aspirations in life. “We are simply responding to what we hear and see from the feedback of our customers—they are tired of renting, they want to get more money, but they also want longer repayment tenures, so we are responding in the affirmative through this campaign,” said Arinaitwe. The campaign also covers the needs of business customers—those owning small and medium enterprises and seeking capit...

Uganda Development Bank (UDB) and American Tower Corporation (ATC) – Uganda have partnered in a blood donation drive to boost Uganda’s blood bank which is estimated to be having a shortfall of over 200,000 units. According to Joshua Allan Mwesiga, the UDB Director for Planning, the 2- days blood donation drive is purposely aimed at addressing inadequacies and shortage of blood stocks in the country. “Blood donation helps in maternal health especially mothers who lose a lot of blood while delivering. It is important that we all join hands in addressing blood stock outs usually faced by our blood banks,” said Mwesiga while launching the campaign at the Uganda Development Bank headquarters on Rwenzori Towers. “We call on every Ugandan to join this campaign,” he added. Members of the public are free to walk-in to the Uganda Development Bank headquarters at Rwenzori Towers from 23 rd to 24 th May 2024 from 8 am to 5pm and donate blood. Dorothy Ssemanda, the ATC – Uganda Chief Ex...

An African Pooled Procurement Mechanism (APPM) presents an opportunity for the continent to collectively work towards lowering the cost of pharmaceutical products, and harmonize regulations that will enhance quality and safe medical supplies for the continent, says Susan Nakhumicha, Kenya’s Cabinet Secretary for Health at the African Ministers of Health, Finance and Trade, experts and development partners meeting in Mombasa, Kenya. The meeting is expected to adopt an approach towards the operationalization of the start-up phase of the AfCFTA-anchored Pharmaceutical Initiative (Pharma Initiative) into the start-up Phase of the African Pooled Procurement Mechanism (APPM) led by the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) with support of Afreximbank and the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA). The Kenyan Cabinet Secretary said that Kenya is committed to be part of the APPM initiative as lowering the cost of health care is one of the four pillars of the country’s un...

Multinational energy company Chevron has joined the Angola Oil & Gas (AOG) 2024 conference ( https://apo-opa. co/3UF9Rg5 ) – Angola’s premier oil and gas event, scheduled for 2-3 October in Luanda - as a platinum sponsor.  The company has been active in Angola for over 70 years, and with stakes in various strategic oil and gas projects, remains committed to increasing production and sustainable oil and gas development for the long-term. Chevron currently holds a 26% market share in Angola. The company has interests in offshore Blocks 0 and 14 - boasting a daily production capacity of 70,000 barrels of liquids and 259 million cubic feet of natural gas – as well as a non-operated interest in the Angola LNG project – the country’s pioneer LNG facility.  Angola LNG processes natural gas from offshore fields and celebrated its 400th cargo delivery in 2023. During the AOG 2024 conference, Chevron is expected to provide insight into the company’s current project portfol...

The African Development Bank Group pledged $2 billion over 10 years towards clean cooking solutions in Africa—a major step along the road to saving the lives of 600,000 mainly women and children each year. Speaking at a landmark summit on Clean Cooking in Africa held in Paris recently, the Bank Group’s President Dr Akinwumi Adesina, said the institution would now commit 20 per cent of all its financing of energy projects towards promoting safe alternatives to cooking with charcoal, wood and biomass. Receiving heads of state and government, and leaders of international organizations at the Elysee Palace to discuss the outcomes of the summit, French President Emmanuel Macron, praised the African Development Bank’s leading role and commitment to delivering clean cooking in Africa. The summit resulted in $2.2 billion pledges from the public and private sectors.  “As part of the Paris Pact for People and the Planet, and with the commitment of Tanzania, Norway, the International En...