STATEMENT BY HON. WYCLIFFE AMBETSA OPARANYA,EGH,MP,MINISTERFOR
PLANNING,
NATIONAL
DEVELOPMENT AND VISION 2030, KENYA , DURING THE 3RD
TICAD MINISTERIAL FOLLOW - UP MEETING - 1ST -2ND MAY,
2011, DAKAR, SENEGAL.
Chairperson,
Distinguished Guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
All Protocols Observed,
At the outset, let me convey the sympathies of my country Kenya
to the Japanese Government during these trying moments ofTsunami, earthquakes and the nuclear accident and the after effects. We are indeed grateful that Japan could afford to keep
this meeting as scheduled despite all these happenings. We praythat all will come to pass and the people of Japan resume theirnormal life.
I would like also to thank the Government and the people ofSenegal for the wonderful hospitality accorded to me and mydelegation since our arrival to this beautiful city of Dakar. Please
accept our heart-felt appreciation for the excellent facilities put at
our disposal.
Chairperson,
For a long time, Africa has been at the cross-roads. According tothe World Economic Situation and Prospects 2011, economic
recovery in Africa has been solid but below potential in mostcountries with economic growth averaging about 5.0 per cent for
2010- 2011. The future looks promising but the challenges ahead
are formidable.

1Africa can still make an about-turn and become an envy continent
to many people. The answer lies with us. Africa is a land of many
opportunities considering the huge natural resources it has. With
good policies and strategies, growth and development will bequickly achieved and alleviate the main problems of poverty,
unemployment arising from rapid population growth, adverse
climate change effects to food crisis. We cannot certainly do thison our own. We need the support of our development partners.
Chairperson,
Kenya is grateful to the support of Japanese Government andmany other development partners in the search for earnest
development path. Through their support, Kenya is building its
infrastructure especially the roads, port and power generation.
Japan provides the highest support in the energy sector. Together
with other five financiers, they have sponsored one of the biggest
power generation projects, OLKARIA 1 GEOTHERMAL POWER
PLANT with a loan facility of JPY 29.516 billion. Japan extended
another loan facility in the Olkaria II project to the tune of Yen
12410 billion. Other than alleviating the energy crisis, theseprojects have generated employment to Kenyans, both skilled andunskilled. In turn, most factories are now able to operate withminimum power interruptions; hence increasing industrialproductivity.
In addition, this project aims to bring about stable electrical power
supply in the East African Region.
Chairperson,Kenya has also received substantial support for roadsdevelopment and, agricultural development and food security
from other development partners. We are building road network
linking Kenya with the rest of Eastern African countries. TheNorthern Corridor linking Kenya with Uganda, Rwanda and Congo2

is in progress as well as parts of the Great North road linking
Tanzania with Kenya and Kenya with Ethiopia. The opening of theroads network will spur growth and trade in all the eastern Africancountries and economic integration in the region.
Chairperson,I am happy to report that under the implementation of theYokohama Action Plan significant progress has been made in theinfrastructure sector.

Chairperson,
A large population of Africa is still largely dependent on
agriculture for food, exports, and income earnings. Yet,productivity in this sector lags far behind the phenomenal
progress made in other regions of the world. Indeed, this is a key
sector for targeting in order to raise the overall productivity andbuild sufficient food security levels for the African economies. This
sector has both forward and backward linkages to overall
development.
Increased agricultural production will lead to increased exports,
more raw materials for agro-processing, more jobs and income,and empowering of the local communities especially women.
They are the bulk who remain in the farms when men travel totowns to look for wage employment.
In addition, African Countries should seriously invest in
sustainable food, agricultural and rural development policies aswell as trade policies that are conducive to fostering food security
for all. All nations should embrace the fundamental element ofgreen growth and low carbon development to ensure sustainable
development. This is because, the environment being a common3

global public good will clearly suffer if we do not ensure a globallycoherent, effective and efficient environment governance system.
Through such a global partnership developing countries should be
supported to access environment friendly technologies,
Technologies like renewable energy using wind-power andgeothermal as well as efficient technologies at costs that areaffordable to small-scale consumers should be supported.
Chairperson,
There are good reasons to assist Africa raise their levels ofinvestment in order to spur growth, development and lower
prevailing poverty levels. However, attention needs to be paid tosome challenges associated with investments. These include
reducing transactions costs for private enterprise, particularly
indirect costs; supporting innovation to take advantage of newtechnological opportunities; and improving skills and institutional
capacity to support productivity growth and competitiveness.
Some of the strategies that could be implemented to sort theabove problems include a sound investment climate, adequate
and reliable infrastructure, exploiting innovation, mainly
underlining the role of information technology and skill formation
productivity and competitiveness development and, building
institutional capacity, targeting supporting capacity of relevantpublic institutions for protecting property rights.
Chairperson,Let me complete my submission by underlying the important roleof development partners in Africa’s quest for a meaningful
partnership in stepping up investment in Africa. It is clear thatlarge-scale investments will need to be front-loaded to ensure theachievement of a “big push”. This certainly requires extensive andsustained capital investment. Again, there is need to bridge thegap between available and potential official development
assistance. I note that inflows of official development assistance4

to Africa increased by nearly 4 per cent in real terms in 2010, but
remain well below target levels of inflows which fell short oncommitments made by the International community by about $16
billion in 2010.
In conclusion, Africa will need to enhance partnership and sharingof knowledge and experiences with other developing countries.
Efforts to also harness South-South and triangular cooperation
should be doubled.
Once again let me sincerely thank the Japanese Government for
their commitment to assist in the development of the AfricanContinent.
Thank you all for your attention.

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