Browsing: Sub-Saharan Africa

The Lamu Port is strategically located at the convergence of major shipping routes, saying its operationalization will open up northern Kenya to international trade, thereby fortifying the country’s position as a top economic gateway to Africa.
With one of the deep-water harbours on the east coast of Africa, Lamu Port has the potential to become a premier transhipment hub for all cargo destined for the continent. Furthermore, Lamu now joins Mombasa Port as a key entry and exit point of cargo, deep into and out of Africa’s hinterland.…

Remittance flows to the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region increased by 2.3 per cent to record about $5.6 billion in 2020 according to a report by World Bank.

The press release from World Bank noted that strong remittance flows to Morocco and Egypt strongly contributed to the growth.

In 2020, flows to Morocco rose to 6.5 per cent while flows to Egypt rose by 11 percent to record a high of nearly $20 billion. Tunisia also recorded an increase of 2.5 per cent.

According to the statement, other economies in the region experienced losses in the same period such as Iraq, Lebanon, Djibouti and Jordan which led to a double-digit decline.

With weak outflows from the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries and moderate growth in the Euro area, remittances are likely to grow in 2021 by 2.6 percent.

In the fourth quarter of 2020 the cost of sending …

Tanzania has earned a record $3 billion from gold sales as price for the precious metal soars in the world market.

Publicized by the Bank of Tanzania, the value of gold exports clocked $3.025 billion in the year ending March 31, 2021, a considerable jump from $2.324 billion that was earned last year.

In fact, gold is doing so well that it has become the country’s top foreign exchange earner, and even overtaken tourism.

Gold prices have been edging up since the corona outbreak last year owing to jittery investors fearing a collapse of other currencies (including the dollar) and opting to store their value in gold.

“As financial markets were hit by the pandemic, investors rushed for gold which they consider as one of the safe haven assets,” report local media.

Consider this, gold represented more than half (55.9 percent) of the value brought home from sell of …

China, which has a competitive advantage in construction, can play a leading role in closing this gap. It is also important to grow local high and low wealth logistics companies. Before the pandemic, demand for African logistics companies had grown, and more venture capital was introduced into new local logistics companies.
Although the Covid-19 crisis is causing trade disruptions, road transportation is still vital to food supply, medicine and other necessities for people and medical institutions.…

In Sub Saharan Africa, growth is expected to rebound by 2.3 per cent in 2021 and 3.1 percent in 2022 from a 2.0 percent contraction in 2020 according to a report by World Bank.

The report is dubbed “Covid-19 and the future of work in Africa: Emerging trends in digital technology adoption” by the World Bank.

Rebound in private consumption, industry and services will be supported by continued growth in the agriculture sector, rise in commodity prices due to rising demand for commodities.

This recovery may however be affected by delayed access to covid-19 vaccines and the resurgence of the pandemic.

Private consumption and business investment spending are likely to be affected by restrictions in case of a second wave before vaccines become widely available.

In 2022, growth is expected to rise to 4.1 percent as vaccines rollouts increases across the region, therefore, providing a stronger boost to consumer and …

A survey revealed that 77 per cent of temporary workers would be willing to receive their wages digitally if this gave them access to health insurance.

Combining digital payments with health insurance benefits offers an excellent opportunity for social inclusion, formalization, and financial innovation.
Data shows that if 50 per cent of temporary workers in Senegal received payments digitally, 45 billion CFA francs would be added to GDP per year (around US$80 million). Paying workers digitally, speeds up the financial inclusion for the population, boosts business competitiveness and increases financial system liquidity. …

The lockdown measures no doubt worked in saving lives but brought a recession to the region due to the dramatic impact on local economies. The SSA which was experiencing the first recession in 25 years has been hit hard and the journey ahead remains difficult because of the lack of vaccines and fiscal stimulus which are a threat to Africa’s economic rebound.

In 2020, Sub-Saharan Africa’s economy shrunk by an extraordinary –1.9 per cent which was the worst outcome on record.…

Data from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) shows that Africa will have an acute water shortage in 25 of the 55 countries on the African continent by 2025. The data warns that these countries will record water levels below 1,700 cubic meters per capita per year.

Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) is home to 50 per cent of the world’s entire population that does not have access to clean water. The water crisis is prevalent. For a better perspective, out of the two billion people living in water insecure, about 1 billion of these are in the SSA countries plagued by water problems. Again, the numbers translate to every 1 in 8 people lacking water on the planet on a daily basis…

A report by Africa Oil & Power (AOP) shows that the appeal of natural gas as a viable energy source has grown rapidly over the past decade. The primary drivers of this demand include reduced costs in comparison to traditional fossil fuels; mounting pressure from the global energy transition; and the growing demand for alternative power generation solutions across Africa. 

Accordingly, the emergence of both Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) and Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) markets has been driven by increased investment, in a bid to address energy security, diversification and electrification challenges. …

The annual value of this trade was reported in 2019 to be on average Ksh 18 billion (US$180 million) which is less than 1 per cent of the total country’s imports. The total imports of textiles in Kenya were valued at around Ksh 131 billion (US$1.3 billion) depicting that the second-hand clothes represented 12.5 per cent of the country’s total imports.…