Tanzania Steps Up Promotion As Premier Global Tourist Destination

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In: Tanzania Foreign Investment News

The government has unveiled investment opportunities in the tourism industry to the visiting global travel agents as it seeks to unleash the industry’s full potential.

The bustling city of Arusha on Thursday played host to an influential gathering of global travel agents and local tour operators, setting the stage for potential future collaborations aimed at boosting Tanzania’s burgeoning tourism industry.

The high-profile Business-to-Business (B2B) event saw the presence of the Deputy Conservation Commissioner in the Research and Training section of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism, Mr Iman Nkuwi, who outlined lucrative investment opportunities in the country’s tourism industry.

In his presentation, Mr Nkuwi emphasised that Tanzania welcomes large-scale investors willing to contribute to the development of state-of-the-art recreation facilities.

Highlighting specific investment avenues, he mentioned the establishment of wildlife captive facilities, luxury lodges and camps, beekeeping ventures, forestry projects and the rapidly growing Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibitions (MICE) ultra facility as key areas of focus.

“We have earmarked a total of 179 investment sites for accommodation facilities with the capacity to add an extra 7,744 beds,” Mr Nkuwi announced.

His statement underscored the significant potential for expansion in Tanzania’s hospitality segment, which is seen as pivotal to cater to the increasing influx of tourists drawn to the nation’s rich biodiversity and unique cultural heritage.

The strategic locations of these investment sites, coupled with the government’s supportive policies, present a golden opportunity for global investors to tap into Tanzania’s thriving tourism industry.

Mr Nkuwi’s insights further revealed that Tanzania’s vast and diverse ecosystems, ranging from the Serengeti plains to the majestic Mount Kilimanjaro, offer unparalleled experiences to visitors, thereby driving the demand for high-quality accommodation and recreational facilities.

Mr Nkuwi reiterated the government’s commitment to facilitating and fostering an investor-friendly environment. With 179 earmarked sites ready for development, Tanzania’s tourism industry stands on the brink of a transformative era, offering promising returns for discerning investors who align with the country’s vision for sustainable and inclusive growth.

Key stakeholders at the event expressed their optimism and willingness to explore these investment opportunities. Turkey Travel Agent who serves as the Vice-President of the Istanbul Tourism Association (ISTA), Mr Murtaza Kalender, said he has fallen in love with the investment opportunities in the hospitality industry.

“We would otherwise not know that there is a huge potential for investment in the hospitality industry, without this special presentation to us. Tanzania is now my second home. I will internalise on the opportunity,” Mr Murtaza noted. He said Tanzania has what it takes to woo 15 million tourists in the next decade, if the current efforts to engage global travel agents are sustained.

“Collaboration between international travel agents and local tour operators is expected to not only bolster the tourism infrastructure but also enhance the overall visitor experience, thus contributing significantly to Tanzania’s economic growth” Mr Murtaza noted.

The B2B event in Arusha marked a significant milestone in Tanzania’s journey towards establishing itself as a premier global tourist destination.

As the dialogues initiated during this gathering evolve into concrete partnerships, the future of Tanzania’s tourism subsector looks indeed bright, brimming with endless possibilities for both investors and travellers alike.

In a landmark initiative aimed at bolstering Tanzania’s tourism industry, 120 global travel agents have embarked on an exclusive familiarisation tour in the northern tourism circuit to experience the natural beauty firsthand.

The brainchild behind this ambitious project, African Queen Adventures CEO, Alice Manupa, shared that the tour was aimed at offering the global agents a firsthand experience of Tanzania’s unparalled natural beauty and rich cultural heritage.

“This is a milestone for the Tanzania tourism industry,” Ms Manupa said, adding: “Considering that 60 per cent of global travel and tourism decisions are influenced by travel agents, hosting 120 of the world’s most influential agents is bound to skyrocket our destination profile and visibility.”

Source: allafrica.com

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Tanzania: Why Climate Change Is Tanzania’s Top Agenda

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In: Tanzania Foreign Investment News

TANZANIA is currently experiencing severe weather as a result of a changing climate.

Increased temperatures, prolonged droughts and erratic rainfall are resulting in significant impacts to public health and livelihoods, with climate projections indicating that the situation is expected to intensify.

The extreme drop of water levels of Lake Victoria, Lake Tanganyika and Lake Jipe in recent years and the dramatic recession of 7 kilometers of Lake Rukwa in about 50 years, are associated, at least in part, with climate change, and are threatening economic and social activities.

The severe droughts which hit most parts of the country leading to severe food shortages, food insecurity, water scarcity, hunger and acute shortage of power signify the vulnerability of the country to impacts of climate change.

The country depends on the media to speak out on all these environmental issues, for the betterment of us, human beings and other living creatures provided that we depend on each other for our survival.

Engineer Matage Dotto, on behalf of the Managing Director of Bukoba Urban Water and Sanitation Authority (BUWASA), appealed to the media across the country to make climate change their top agenda by educating the public on its effects and necessary steps to be taken.

“Specialization makes a journalist to be perfect. You should focus on specialization in different fields, including environmental reporting,” he said.

Several people are reported to have died while significant infrastructures were destroyed by floods that recently hit Kagera Region.

Also Read: Fueling equality: How clean cooking drives women’s empowerment in Tanzania

Over 300 households were recently displaced following landslides which hit Muleba District’s Ilemela village.

Reports indicate that the landslide started slowly on April 17th of this year, followed by a big landslide that swept through Bushabo hamlet, damaging at least 14 houses completely while over 300 families were displaced.

However, there were no casualties. A camp for fishermen located at Bushabo hamlet was completely destroyed by the landslide. This is the first incident involving a landslide.

The incident has caused panic among citizens. A significant number of crops had also been washed away. A landslide is a mass movement of material, such as rock, earth or debris, down a slope.

This can happen suddenly or more slowly over long periods of time. When the force of gravity acting on a slope exceeds the resisting force of a slope, the slope will fail, and a landslide occurs. Landslides are caused by rain, earthquakes, volcanos and other factors.

Vice President Dr Philip Mpango, on the other hand, has called on international stakeholders to cooperate and support Tanzania in climate change adaptation, including disaster control and response, and building the capacity of the early warning system.

Cooperation can be further increased in building the ability to cope with climate change and facilitating modern agriculture that is compatible with the climate to improve productivity for smallholder farmers.

President Samia Suluhu Hassan has already launched the African Women Clean Cooking Support Programme (AWCCSP) and the National Strategy for Clean Cooking Energy 2024-2034.

President Samia recently co-chaired the Paris Clean Cooking Energy Summit, alongside African Development Bank Group President Dr Akinwumi Adesina, Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store of Norway and International Energy Agency Executive Director, Fatih Birol.

The Paris summit aimed to secure commitments toward 4 billion US dollars (about 10tr/- ) needed to close clean cooking funding gap for African women.

The landmark event aimed to drive significant change in clean cooking access for the nearly one billion Africans using polluting fuels, which cause the premature deaths of approximately half a million women and children every year.

Women and girls spend up to five hours a day collecting fuel and cooking. This leaveslittle time for education, social or economic activities.

Also Read: COLUMN: FROM TABORA WITH LOVE. I think soon we will have to own a boat

Worldwide, according to the African Development Bank (AFDB) statement, the annual economic cost of women and girls’ time searching for fuel wood is estimated at 800 billion US dollars. The health costs are as high as 1.4 trillion US dollars.

“The capital investment needed to ensure universal clean cooking access in Africa by 2030 is accessible,” AFDB said adding, “The 4.0 billion US dollars needed annually is a small fraction of the 2.8 trillion US dollars invested globally in energy each year”.

Clean cooking initiatives are eligible under the Climate Action Window (CAW) of the African Development Fund (ADF), the AFDB Group’s concessional window for 37 of Africa’s poorest and most vulnerable countries.

Increased adoption of clean cooking fuels such as electricity, biogas and sustainable biofuels will improve the health and well- being of Africa’s women and children and also protect Africa’s forests.

Several African countries have begun taking proactive measures to accelerate clean cooking adoption. Data indicate that about 6.7 per cent of Tanzanian population are using clean cooking energy, Kenya (23 percent), Uganda (0.7 percent), Ghana (30 percent) and India (71.7 per cent).

The AFDB’s commitment to addressing the clean cooking crisis aligns with its high five priorities- particularly “Light Up and Power Africa” and “Improve the Quality of Life for the People of Africa.”

Source: allafrica.com

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Mandisa Maya: The woman holding South Africa’s legal future

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In: Tanzania Foreign Investment News

By CHRIS ERASMUS

Mandisa Maya is set to lead South Africa’s judiciary for the next 10 years, after the Judicial Service Commission (JSC), which oversees senior judicial appointments, determined on Tuesday to recommend her appointment as chief justice by President Cyril Ramaphosa.

As the first woman to hold such a position in the country’s history, it seems like a reward for a judge who stayed away from controversy.

However, the position itself is increasingly the focus of political contention, as is the entire legal system, part based on Roman-Dutch and part on English jurisprudence.

Since the multi-party negotiations of 1992/93, some radical elements have been criticising those political agreements, along with the resulting constitution, as effectively entrenching land theft and other colonial-era excesses, as well as the apartheid race-based system which shaped the modern urban landscapes of this still-divided country.

Read: Deep-rooted graft tops list for South Africa ‘failing state’

But these voices were drowned out by the vast majority’s acceptance of a new deal in what has been the ‘land of apartheid’, the biases embedded in an inherited legal system being left to post-apartheid administrations to sort out.

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But for the likes of former president Jacob Zuma and his newly minted uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK) party, only a complete rewrite of the entire structure of the law is sufficient.

Zuma himself is still facing 783 counts of fraud, corruption and money laundering charges arising from alleged kickbacks during a late 1990s arms deal.

But he is desperate to have both the ‘Eurocentric’ laws of South Africa changed, and the negotiated constitution thrown out just as much as he demands a reversion to something akin to slightly modernised traditional tribal law.  Recently, the courts struck his name off the ballot over his past conduct including a jail term her served for contempt of Court.

Along with MK, Julius Malema and his Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) have blown hot and cold over South Africa’s legal structures.

Malema and a few of his close lieutenants have also come in for legal scrutiny over possible state capture-style graft, or other alleged improprieties.

At one point, the EFF, which is overtly Pan-Africanist, was arguing against its own policies when anti-immigrant sentiments were running high amid further bouts of violent xenophobia.

Read: Mandela vision of Black unity fades as SA shuts door to migrants

The Party argued that the bar for successful amnesty applications was too low, and too many people were being allowed into the country.

The EFF stand seems more closely related to direct effects of the law on the party leaders than any underlying ideological issues, though it maintains a strong line that should it gain power, it will wield existing and any new laws with vigour, believing in the centralisation of power in a Marxist-Leninist state system.

Both MK and the EFF also say they want all major industries nationalised.

Put together, these two political alignments could garner at least a quatre of the vote in the elections due on Wednesday next week, according to latest opinion polls.

That may not be a direct or immediate threat to South Africa’s current legal framework.

However, there is a growing populist sentiment that ‘old colonial laws and systems must go’, even though most of those supporting such calls have little idea of the implications.

Outgoing Chief Justice Raymond Zondo was something of a ‘controversial’ choice, when appointed by President Cyril Ramaphosa in April 2022, despite being ‘next in line’ as Deputy Chief Justice.

This was due to his four-year stint as chair of the commission of inquiry into state capture graft, ironically signed into law by then outgoing president Zuma as one of his last official acts before being forced to resign by his own ruling African National Congress (ANC) party in 2018.

That means that Justice Maya’s new heights bring her the task of managing the politics related to the calls for a change in legal framework, together with the potential legal drams that may ensue over which way to go about change.  

Born in March 1964 in the then apartheid-era ‘black homeland’ of Transkei, now the Eastern Cape province, Mandisa Muriel Lindelwa Maya was appointed Deputy Chief Justice of South Africa soon after missing out on the top slot in 2022 to Justice Zondo. 

She has had a stellar career from humble beginnings and was formerly the president of the Supreme Court of Appeal from 2017 to 2022.

Initially a prosecutor and state law adviser, she was admitted as an advocate in 1994. 

Former president Thabo Mbeki appointed her to the Supreme Court of Appeal in June 2006. In the appellate court, she was elevated to the deputy presidency in September 2015 and the presidency in May 2017.

She was the first black woman to serve in the Supreme Court of Appeal, as well as the court’s first woman deputy president and first woman president.

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Cheese rolling champion shares top three tips for winning

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In: Tanzania Foreign Investment News

11 hours ago

Emma Grimshaw,BBC News, West of England

Cheese rolling champion shares top three tips for winningBBC Man holding cheese above his headBBC

A cheese rolling champion who has won the extreme competition more times than anyone else has shared his top tips.

Chris Anderson, from Brockworth, Gloucestershire, has claimed the title 23 times since he was 16 years old.

Dubbed one of the UK’s toughest downhill races, the annual event, which takes place on Monday, sees competitors chase a 7lb (3kg) Double Gloucester cheese wheel down the almost-vertical Coopers Hill in Brockworth.

The father-of-three plans to compete for another few years – until his eldest son can take over the baton.

Cheese rolling champion shares top three tips for winningMen rolling down hill

“It’s all over so quickly,” he said. “The first time I won I broke my ankle and had to get stretchered away.

“I’m from the local village, so it’s good to keep the record in the village. For the locals, it’s a massive event for us.”

Preparations for the competition have been taking place all week; trimming away nettles, picking up litter and cutting the grass.

Mr Anderson’s top three tips for people planning to take part are:

  • Make sure you know what you are getting into – it is dangerous
  • If you fall over, get to your feet as quickly as possible
  • Lean backwards when you are running down
Cheese rolling champion shares top three tips for winningTwo men smiling at camera holding cheese

The race, which dates back centuries, could be linked to a former belief that if you threw cheese down a hill before harvest it would bring good luck, Mr Anderson said.

“No one knows for sure,” he said.

“There were lots of stories – and no one knows how throwing cheese turned into running after it.”

Throughout his decades of competing, Mr Anderson has also bruised his kidney.

“The older I get the more scared I am,” he said.

“I have more to risk – I have a family to look after.”

Competitors will be heading to Gloucestershire from all over the world for the event on Monday 27 May.

The winner of each race gets to keep the Double Gloucester cheese wheel.

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President Ruto seals multibillion deals in White House

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In: Tanzania Foreign Investment News

President William Ruto and his US counterpart Joe Biden on Thursday announced a raft of multibillion-shilling new investment deals in Kenya as the two countries marked 60 years of partnership.

The new investment deals, announced on the final day of President Ruto’s four-day State visit to the US, largely focus on green energy, security, education and governance.

Dr Ruto became the first African leader to make a State Visit to Washington in 16 years since John Kufuor of Ghana in 2008.

“Decades of strong security cooperation between the United States and Kenya have played a critical role in East Africa and beyond,” the White House said on Thursday in a fact sheet of the State Visit. “This partnership extends to areas including international peacekeeping, peace negotiations, security governance, refugee inclusion, and cooperation in cybersecurity.”

The White House said Dr Ruto’s State Visit has strengthened the partnership between Washington and Nairobi on combating terrorist groups in East Africa, largely targeting al-Shabaab and ISIS elements in the region.

As a result, President Biden was later Thursday evening set to designate Kenya as a major non-NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organisation) ally, reflecting Kenya’s status in cooperating with the US counterterrorism operations in Africa. Such a designation underlies Kenya’s growing status.

The United States has committed $4.9 million (Sh642 million under prevailing conversion rates of $1 is equal to Sh131) in new funding for Kenya and other East African countries to improve cooperation and coordination in fighting international criminal networks and holding criminals accountable.

The funding will go towards capacity building and reform efforts within the Kenyan police and justice sectors at a time when the country has committed to deploy its police to lead the Multinational Security Support (MSS) mission to provide security assistance to Haiti.

The two countries also announced a new $7 million (Sh917 million) partnership to advance and strengthen the modernisation and professionalisation of Kenya’s National Police Service, largely focused on staff and training development.

In an effort to reduce overcrowding in Kenya’s prisons and improve conditions in detention centres, Washington has announced a new $2.2 million (Sh288 million) initiative to provide training, mentoring, and technical assistance to implement priority reforms. Dr Ruto’s visit came on the back of Washington through 2024 National Trade Estimate Report on Foreign Trade Barriers (NTE), complaining of entrenched bribery, extortion and political interference in Kenya’s judicial system as a barrier to attracting investments. In this regard, the US said it will provide $1.55 million (about Sh203 million) towards programmes aimed at combating corruption.

That funding comprises $500,000 (Sh65.5 million) under the new Fiscal Integrity Programme to enhance transparency in Kenya’s budget processes, by enhancing inclusivity and increasing citizen engagement.

A similar amount will go towards broadening the reach and effectiveness of anti-corruption advocacy by empowering civil society actors to create and disseminate multimedia content that engages citizens and mobilises action against corruption.

Some $250,000 (Sh32.75 million) will be injected into supporting the Kenyan government to combat corruption through the Global Accountability Programme, while $300,000 (Sh39.3 million) will go to Kenya’s proposed Whistleblower Protection law aimed at strengthening the country’s anti-corruption legal architecture.

Dr Ruto’s foreign policy realignment with traditional partners such as the US will also likely see increased funding towards the civil society groups, whose activities were largely curtailed during the previous regime of Uhuru Kenyatta.

The US and agencies announced $2.6 million (Sh340.6 million) towards supporting independent civil society groups. This comprises an additional $1.3 million (Sh170.3 million) of funding by US Agency for International Development (USAID) under youth empowerment programme to strengthen political engagement at the subnational level and $600,000 (Sh78.6 million) to advance disability inclusion.

The US also plans to spend $700,000 (Sh91.7 million) in new assistance to support these efforts to institutionalise groundbreaking, global best practices for civil society protections after Dr Ruto executed the legal instruments to operationalise the 2013 Public Benefits Organization Act on May 9. That support is in addition to the $2.7 million (Sh353.7 million) funding the US is already providing to improve civil society engagement in and oversight of governance processes.

“Washington is showing that Kenya is a major ally of the US,” David Monda, a Kenyan international relations scholar who teaches political science at the City University of New York, said via email. “Washington is indicating to other continental powers like South Africa that have taken positions antagonistic to the US on the Russia-Ukraine War and the Israel-Hamas conflict, that Washington has alternatives on the continent.”

Other major deals announced during Dr Ruto’s visit to the US include $1.5 million (Sh196.5 million) in new technical assistance to support Kenya’s electoral legal framework reform process aimed at strengthening the election commission, political parties, and campaign finance.

The US has also committed $3.6 million to support the accelerated connection of more homes, businesses, and institutions in Kenya to cleaner electricity as part of its Empowering East and Central Africa programme.

Meanwhile, the Kenya National Highways Authority (Kenha) and US-based Private Equity Everstrong Capital LLC have signed a deal to start the construction of the $3.6 billion (Sh472.9 billion) expressway from Mombasa to Nairobi. Dubbed Usahihi Expressway, the toll road will upset the Chinese-built Mombasa-Nairobi Standard Gauge Railway (SGR), as a major rival for traffic.

The US has also lined up $250 million (Sh32.75 billion) in new investments in Kenya through the International Development Finance Corporation (DFC), including $180 million (Sh23.58 billion) for a major affordable housing project. That will bring DFC’s portfolio in Kenya to over $1 billion (Sh131 billion).

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Unit trusts add Sh10 billion assets in Q1

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In: Tanzania Foreign Investment News

Unit trusts or collective investment schemes added Sh10.3 billion in assets in the first three months of the year to the end of March as new capital continued to drive the expansion of the investment vehicle.

According to fresh data from the Capital Markets Authority (CMA), the units’ assets under management rose to Sh225.4 billion in March from Sh215.1 billion in December.

Recently licensed schemes have continued to lead the way in growing the asset base of the unit trusts, with the Etica Unit Trust Scheme, for instance, having more than tripled its assets to Sh1 billion from Sh275.5 million previously.

Lofty-Corban Unit Trust Scheme, GenAfrica and KCB Unit Trust Scheme, meanwhile, saw their assets under management rising by 98 percent, 79.9 percent and 70.7 percent to Sh908.7 million, Sh757.4 million, and Sh1.5 billion, respectively.

Legacy collective schemes saw a mixed performance in the quarter, with the assets of CIC Unit Trust, for instance, sliding by 2.2 percent to Sh61.9 billion from Sh63.3 billion in December, while Sanlam Unit Trust assets rose by 18.2 percent to Sh29.6 billion.

“The assets under management increased steadily over the past six years from Sh56.6 billion as of March 31, 2018 to Sh225.4 billion as of March 31, 2024,” CMA indicated.

Securities issued by the government remained the leading investment destination for the unit trusts, accounting for 48 percent of the assets, having grown by six percent in the quarter to Sh107.6 billion from Sh101.1 billion.

The schemes, however, raised holdings of cash and demand deposits by 54 percent, with the assets at Sh35.2 billion in March from Sh22.9 billion at the end of last year.

Investments in fixed deposits, listed and unlisted securities, off-shore investments, and immovable property were all down in the period, signifying a stance of investing in cash or near-cash instruments.

Money market funds, which primarily invest in short-term instruments, including treasury bills and fixed deposits, remained the leading category of unit trusts with Sh148.6 billion in assets, having grown by six percent in the quarter.

Equity funds made a return to growth in the three months on improved returns from the stock market, with assets rising by nine percent to Sh2.6 billion from Sh2.4 billion.]

The CMA has approved 36 collective investment schemes, which comprise 150 funds.

The unit trusts have soared on the back of technology, innovations such as the daily distribution of interest and a low floor for investing, which targets small retail investors who put as little as Sh100 as their initial investment.

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I&M Bank profit up 31pc to Sh3.3bn in first quarter

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In: Tanzania Foreign Investment News

I&M Group has posted a 30.9 percent jump in net profit to Sh3.32 billion in the first quarter of trading ended March 2024 on increased interest income.

The jump in net earnings was from Sh2.54 billion posted in a similar three-month period of last year as net interest income, mainly from lending, grew 37.7 percent to Sh8.39 billion.

The rise in net interest income made up for a 9.4 percent fall in non-interest income to Sh3.16 billion for the lender that mid-February last year waived transactional fees for customers moving money from the bank to mobile money platforms like M-Pesa.

The lender last month explained that the waiver has seen it double the pace of growth in personal accounts, enabling it to expand other business lines, including loan disbursements.

Net loans and advances to customers closed March 2024 at Sh291.48 billion, marking a 13 percent growth from Sh257.7 billion in a similar period last year.

I&M’s operating expenses rose 10 percent to Sh6.64 billion in the period under review even as it cut provisioning for loan defaults to Sh1.54 billion from Sh1.64 billion.

The rise in operating expenses was driven by a 24.2 percent rise in staff costs to Sh1.96 billion, reflecting the expanded staff size and salary increment. The lender mid-January this year opened eight new branches in Kenya and plans to add 12 before the end of the year.

Other operating expenses went up by 15 percent to Sh2.2 billion, contributing to the overall rise in the operating costs for the Nairobi Securities Exchange-listed lender.

The lender follows other tier I lenders including KCB Group, Equity Group, Cooperative Bank of Kenya, NCBA Group and Stanbic Bank which have all posted a growth in net profit in the quarter under review. KCB leads the pack, with net earnings having grown 69 percent to Sh16.06 billion.

I&M will this Friday, March 24, pay a dividend of Sh2.55 per share amounting to Sh4.22 billion on the performance for the year ended December 2023 in which net profit rose 12.7 percent to Sh12.62 billion.

The payout, to be given to shareholders who were on the company’s register at the close of business on April 18, will mark the third straight year of increased distribution to shareholders. The distribution equals what the lender paid in 2019.

I&M founder Suresh Shah, who is also the chairperson, will receive Sh445.2 million for his 10.6 percent stake in the lender while his two sons—Sachit Shah and Sarit Shah—will each receive Sh96.6 million for their stake of 2.3 percent each.

The group is planning to double its physical branches in Kenya to 100 by the end of 2026 in the race to increase its share of retail banking business in the country.

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