Browsing: Zanzibar

• Zanzibar is fast-tracking the start of direct flights to and from Saudia Arabia.
• Trade between Zanzibar and Qatar more than doubles in the last decade.
• New UAE consulate in Zanzibar spearheading investment pacts between the two countries.

The island of Zanzibar is championing a renaissance in trade with talks on securing agreement for direct flights to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. This comes only months after Saudi Arabia introduced direct flights to the country’s commercial capital of Dar es Salaam.

The direct flight from Saudi Arabia effectively cuts travel time and reduces travel costs by more than half. Travel time from Julius Nyerere International Airport in Dar es Salaam to King Abdulazz International Airport in Jeddah, Saudia Arabia is now roughly 4 hours 40 minutes. Previously, travelers were spending 10 hours to complete the journey.

Tanzania Works and Transport Minister Makame Mbarawa said the direct flights will serve to boost international travelers’ …

• Zanzibar has entered into a deal with Belgium to attract more tourists to the East African coastal Island.
• The number of tourist arrivals in Tanzania is projected to increase in 2023. The country saw 62.7 per cent jump in new arrivals between January and July last year.
• Tanzania received a total of 100,600 tourists from USA in 2022 followed closely by France that was the source of 100,371 holidaymakers.

Zanzibar’s tourism development initiative under its Blue Economy agenda is starting to pay dividend with the isles setting its sights on attracting tourists from Belgium.

Isle’s President Hussein Mwinyi recently met with Belgium’s Ambassador to Tanzania Peter Huyghebaert, and  unveiled ongoing improvement of infrastructure in Zanzibar to improve tourists’ experience.

President Mwinyi cited infrastructure improvements such as airports and roads, access to power and water as well as the construction of new hotels by the private sector.

“We have been working …

• Zanzibar President Mwinyi signs Zanzibar Sustainable Tourism Declaration
• Greener Zanzibar Tourism Strategy to boost island’s blue economy
• World Bank urges Zanzibar to increase local content in tourism

Zanzibar President Dr. Hussein A. Mwinyi has pledged to ensure a greener and more sustainable approach to tourism in Zanzibar following the signing of the Zanzibar Sustainable Tourism Declaration.

The declaration recognizes and commits Zanzibar to uphold global sustainable tourism standards as adopted by international institutions and world leaders. As part of the island’s Greener Zanzibar Tourism Strategy, the declaration sets Zanzibar on a path to embed sustainable strategies as part of its tourism growth plan.

President Mwinyi signed the declaration at the first Zanzibar Tourism Investment and Travel Exhibition (ZTITE) held on the island in February where he was the guest of honour.

The three-day event was held from the 9th to the 11th by the Zanzibar Commission for Tourism (ZCT)  under …

• Tanzania inflation hits five year high
• Zanzibar bans export of food commodoties ahead of Holy Month
• China reopens market, expected to speed global recovery

Tanzania’s annual inflation rate has hit its highest point in five years clocking 4.9% in January 2023 and at the close of February the rate was no better.

According to the Tanzania Central Bank The Bank of Tanzania (BoT), the prices of food & non-alcoholic beverages went up by 9.9% up from 9.7% in December of last year.

The BoT monthly economic update report showed similar increase in prices across all sectors and indicator that the cost of living in Tanzania has increased drastically. Wit no matching increase in income, this means that the burden of acquiring daily basic needs like food has become worse for Tanzanians.

With percentages in the brackets here are how several sectors are suffering from price increase in Tanzania: Transportation (6.2% …

The Bwefum ICT Community Centre is one of 11 ICT hubs, which the union government through the Universal Communication Service Access Fund (UCSAF) has constructed in Unguja and Pemba along with supporting the construction of 42 other communication towers across the islands.

These towers improve ICT across the island and as a result it means improved interconnectivity between businesses, government authorities and the general public.

President Mwinyi emphasized that inter-connectivity will help improve social services. For example, when it comes to healthcare provision, ICT is vital in communication between service providers allowing for the transfer of patient and staff info seamlessly in the shortest time possible.…

Africa’s nascent digital sector is expanding thanks in large part to innovation. In reality, at least 1031 innovation centres were active throughout Africa as of October 2021, according to research by Briter Bridges and AfriLabs, and there is a strong desire to establish more.

These hubs include coworking spaces, incubators, and accelerators that promote the region’s transformational economic growth and development through entrepreneurship and innovation.

According to the Briter Bridges and AfriLabs study, Nigeria has the most densely populated ecosystem, with 164 operating hubs, 149 of which are domestic and 15 of which are foreign; Kenya and South Africa follow suit with 100 and 90 hubs each.

According to the survey, North Africa has rapidly expanded over the past five years, with over 200 hubs in Egypt, Tunisia, and Morocco.…

United for Green is working to ensure that Africans do not get to these extremes. By empowering women, the plan is to provide clean fuel at the least risk to the environment, especially forests which are the major biomass fuel sources.

Projections show that the demand for fuel wood will see more than 2.8 million hectares of forest lost just to meet Dar es Salaam’s charcoal needs.

United for Green started before the pandemic hit in 2019, when the concept of bio charcoal was born several kilometres away in Kadzinuni, Kenya. CR Hope Foundation partnered with a group of students from Exeter University in the UK to design the charcoal briquettes production process.…

The programme which produces briquettes from agricultural waste is expanding beyond Tanzania and has already started in Kenya as United For Green. Cameroon is the other country that the programme is launching next.

To produce organic charcoal, women are trained to convert biomass to charcoal which also happens to be reusable.

CR Hope Foundation partnered with Exeter University to produce the charcoal briquettes. The briquettes are produced using pyrolysis. Pyrolysis is the thermochemical decomposition of organic matter resulting in no condensable gases, condensable liquids and a solid residual coproduct, charcoal or biochar in an inert environment in the absence of oxygen.…

The goal here is to have more companies register on the island to increase Zanzibar’s internal revenue through taxes and related fees. The move is also expected to create employment on the island as companies open subsidiaries they will naturally have to hire.

Overall, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF ), last year’s growth of around 4 per cent is expected to pick up to about 5½ per cent this year and to then maintain a steady growth of the next few years, assuming no other pandemic strikes that are.

Ceterisperibus, should the economic reforms announced by the new administration and the envisaged improvements in the business climate materialize, then medium-term growth could reach 6 per cent, says the IMF.…

Another study by PureProfile, an advertising agency company, surveyed investors responsible for around US$700 billion assets under management. The results showed that twenty-five per cent of investor managers expect Africa’s internet industry to increase by 51 per cent in the next three years.

Over 71 per cent of professional investors expect the affordability of mobile phones in Africa to improve by 2025. Currently, the mobile phone economy accounts for an average of 6.8 per cent of monthly incomes. Ninety-seven per cent of all professional investors believe that the Coronavirus pandemic has accelerated the demand for mobile phones.

World Mobile is compounding its unique hybrid mobile network supported by low altitude platform balloons in Zanzibar, which it plans to roll out throughout the continent. The company is already in discussions with government officials in Tanzania, Kenya, and other territories underserviced by traditional mobile operators.…