so missing means sexual affection only?
back to business...how do u explain ur donor dependence to be at 6% for this year's budget if Kibaki anatembeza uombaomba kila kona? and year before
this was the story ! R u proud of that lending habit? can u call that to be a prosperous move? How about lending from ur own banks? including
this and
this?
[h=1]Japan, China race to pump money into EA infrastructure projects[/h]
Chinese workers from the Thika road project team of China Wuyi Company Limited teach local workers to tie steel bars at the construction site of a crossroad along Nairobi-Thika highway on July 18, 2011. File
Japan and China are competing for control of East Africa's economic landscape, which has seen each country roll out big projects in the region.
Last week, Japan moved to strengthen its position as a top investment partner by providing a Ksh28.9 billion ($340.6 million) loan to the Kenya government for building a bypass in Mombasa to ease traffic from the port.
The new rivalry is informed by the fact that the region's prospects look much brighter after the oil and gas finds of the past two years in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.
(Read:
Give China all the roads; traditional donors have moved on to other projects)
The day after Japan announced the loan on Tuesday, China, announced a $100 million (Ksh8.5 billion) grant to the Kenyan government for the installation of closed circuit television cameras in major cities and towns to monitor terror activities.
The $100 million grant pales in comparison with the other larger investments that China has made, especially in infrastructure and energy sectors. However, the significance of the grant is that it shows the Asian nation is attuned to Kenya's most pressing problems.
According to a report by audit firm Ernst and Young, released earlier this month, China has fared much better than Japan in terms of job creation and investments in the region. This is important because of the region's high population growth rate.
Japan is lagging behind but is keen on expanding its influence in the East African region. It gave Uganda Ush35.7 billion ($14.5 million) in February, to fund schools and health care centres in northern Uganda. The social sector has been the biggest beneficiary of Japan's investment as Chinese firms eye the oil find in Uganda.
Japan is also keen on funding geothermal projects in Rwanda. The latter is looking to raise Rwf 600 billion ($1 billion) to boost its electricity production. Rwanda said it hopes to produce 300MW of geothermal power by 2017 and some European firms and China have shown interest in funding the project.
There has been a shift in the balance of trade, with the Chinese having the upper hand compared with the Japanese.
Also, while both countries were at par on the value of imports into Kenya five years ago, the Chinese have raced far ahead. Kenya's imports from China reached Ksh144 billion ($1.69 billion) compared with Japan's Ksh58.6 billion ($690 million) in 2011, according to the recently released Economic Survey 2012.
This is why Japan has been keen on playing catch up by pumping more money into regional economies. The Japan International Co-operation Agency (JICA) increased its grants to Kenya from ¥1.75 billion (Ksh1.8 billion) in 2008 to ¥2.8 billion (Ksh3.05 billion) in 2011, according to the annual report. But its official development assistance has been declining, falling to ¥1.2 billion (Ksh1.29 billion) from ¥1.6 billion (Ksh1.71 billion) in 2008. The Japanese are mostly lending to infrastructure and energy projects.
"The development of the port is considered a commercial project," said Matasura Hiroshi, head of economic co-operation at the Japanese embassy in Nairobi.
This means that a company like Toyota, which plans to import and retail secondhand cars, will benefit from the improvement of the port through faster clearance of goods. "As a government, we want to push more Japanese companies to invest in Kenya and Africa," said Mr Hiroshi.
Toyota Tsusho Corp, a Japanese firm, won the bid to build new geothermal plants worth Ksh40 billion ($481 million), cementing Japan's involvement in Kenya's geothermal power generation. The same Japanese firm has already completed a feasibility study of Kenya's Lamu port and is expected to make a financial proposal. The Lamu port appears to be the most attractive alternate route for South Sudan's oil at this time.
Other Japanese firms are also making inroads into the consumer markets. Toyota, the auto maker, earlier this month through its subsidiary Toyotsu, opened a Ksh500 million ($5.88 million) showroom in Nairobi and a spare parts shop that would allow it to scale up imports of brands such as Subaru, Daihatsu, Hino trucks and buses.
"Japan and China are large economies and they are looking for markets where they can deploy their capital," said Samuel Nyandemo, a senior lecturer in economics at the University of Nairobi. "Japan wants to show China that it can also flex its muscle and establish its presence here. It is good for Kenya to have the two competing. But the question we need to ask ourselves is how efficiently we can use their money," said Dr Nyandemo.
China promised South Sudan $8 billion in new investments earlier this month. The loan will fund roads, bridges, hydropower, agriculture, and telecommunications projects over the next two years in Africa's newest state.
"China's primary focus seems to be on the oil. Everything that they are doing seems targeted at finding ways of getting the oil faster to China," said Gitau Githongo, an economist based in Nairobi. The Chinese constructed Kenya's first super highway, the Thika Road, and have also won contracts to construct other bypass roads in Nairobi.
But the analysts are concerned that the two nations are not building local capacity.
Japan, China race to pump money into EA infrastructure projects*- Business*|theeastafrican.co.ke
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Geothermal: Kenya pins its hopes on steam power - FT.com
June 19, 2012 10:02 pm
[h=1]Geothermal: Kenya pins its hopes on steam power[/h] By Katrina Manson
The Menengai volcano, where engineers are hunting for steam
Deep inside the rim of the world's second-largest volcanic caldera, the smell of rotten eggs and furious clouds of white smoke hug the rugged land. Here, where the earth's crust thins as the Rift Valley twists its way north, scientists are hunting for steam.
Stephen Kalgogo, an engineer, stands at the foot of a $30m rig that plunges its drill-bit more than 2km into the sulphurous heart of the Menengai volcano, 180km north-west of Nairobi. He says: "We've drilled eight wells and found steam in every one."
More video
It is at the forefront of hopes that geothermal energy will boost
Kenya's dismal power output. By channelling high pressure steam sourced deep underground to turn turbines, the government hopes to make the most of an estimated 10,000MW of geothermal potential.
For now, the entire country produces 1,200MW, serving only 20 per cent of the population, and power prices are so high that they limit manufacturing and the jobs that go with it.
[h=3]More[/h][h=4]On this story[/h]
[h=4]IN Africa & the Green Economy 2012[/h]
The approach appeals to deep-pocketed international development finance institutions that are keen to back clean energy.
Gabriel Negatu, east Africa regional director at the African Development Bank, says: "It's risky technology, but in the long term it is clean, sustainable – much more reliable than hydro, which is vulnerable to rainfall and drought – and abundant."
The bank is putting
$145m into the Menengai project. The World Bank, French and Japanese development agencies and others have given more than $500m in loans and grants and promise more.
Even so, progress has been slow. Olkaria, south of Lake Naivasha in Kenya's Great Rift Valley and Africa's first geothermal power field, has taken more than 30 years to develop.
Today it produces 210MW, which makes Kenya the largest geothermal producer in Africa. However, it is a long way short of the 5,530MW target for 2030, by which time the government predicts that overall power demand will rise to 21,620MW.
Olkaria alone can produce 1,600MW, and has started drilling more projects.
"The pace of development has been slower than we wanted, partly because of the risks of hitting dry wells," says Hino Hiroyuki, economic adviser to the prime minister Raila Odinga, who is spearheading Kenya's green energy development.
To establish even a 50MW steam resource, prospectors must drill an average of 13 holes costing close to $100m just to locate the steam, and billions more are needed for large power plants. State-controlled KenGen, the country's main power generator, says the 5,000MW target is likely to cost $20bn.
The state-owned Geothermal Development Company (GDC), set up three years ago, has taken on much of the risk. It assesses and drills the holes, with a view to handing steam conversion and power generation to private investors, who can recoup their costs against fixed power prices. With the aid of loans, it is buying its own drill rigs rather than contracting expensive Chinese equipment, which will shave one-third off the cost of drilling.
But it may not be enough, says Prof Hiroyuki. "The pace of development is constrained by the amount of tax money that can be made available, or borrowings from the World Bank, African Development Bank and others," he says, mindful that some private sector groups sit on licences and wait for the value to rise.
Financiers say investors should be able to come in sooner, and GDC has asked for equity funding of up to 80 per cent for early-stage development for Menengai's phase two; this is set to deliver 800MW by 2021.
Several technological and financial developments may lower costs and make private sector participation easier.
One will reduce the lag between discovering steam and turning it into power – and money. Mini-plants installed at the well head can convert steam to power on-site, quickly and inexpensively. "Well head is the way to go for both speed and efficiency," says David Horsey of Civicom, which built Kenya's first 2.5MW wellhead at Eburru.
Construction experts say a well could be drilled for $2m, rather than government estimates of three times more.
Steam-powered energy from well head mini-plants could power rigs that are drilling other wells, saving on expensive diesel. Private sector outfits are winning bids to build well head generators next year.
The other effort is to reduce the risk of drilling dud holes through various insurance schemes, which could accelerate private investment. A geothermal risk mitigation facility from Germany's KFW Development Bank will finance 40 per cent of exploration, and
Munich Re, a German insurance company, is developing a policy for Kenya.
"Kenya has a fantastic precedent in the 200MW that they have already installed," says George Delacherois Day, operations manager at UK-based Cluff Geothermal, which is interested in building a steam conversion plant at Menengai.
He says Kenya's "very nice" geothermal legal framework makes the country investor-friendly, while insurance schemes would be a great bonus: "All the mechanisms are there to get excited, and now we are looking to the Kenyan government to allow us to participate in exploration."
Geothermal: Kenya pins its hopes on steam power - FT.com
