US SECRETARY OF STATE MADAME HILARY CLINTON TO LEAD AMERICAN TRADE DELEGATION TO THE AGOA FORUM IN NAIROBI NEXT WEEK.
BUSINESS NEWS By Leo Odera Omolo In Kisumu City
THE US Secretary of State Mrs. Hilary Clinton is expected in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi next week as the head of the America trade delegation to Agoa forum.
Political pundits are quick in saying that she is expected to boost the country’s image, tarnished by last year post-election mayhem, as an investment destination.
The US Embassy in Nairobi has confirmed the visit through an announcement that Mrs Clinton will be accompanied by the Secretary of the Department of Agriculture, Tom Vilisack, and her country’s Trade representative Ron Kirk will be in Nairobi to attend the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act [AGOA} Forum, which is set to be held from August 4-8.
“It will be a boom to the county’s image if the government utilizes the opportunity to state concrete steps it has taken to help improve Kenya’s image from last year’s problems”, said Eugene Young, the US Embassy’s economic counselor.
The theme of the AGOA forum is ’Realising the full potential of Agoa through expansion of trade and investment”. The forum comes at a time when Kenya’s leadership has come under the severest criticism by the Obama administration in Washington for corruption and bad governance.
The government of Kenya will have to spend more than USD 1.25 million on the forum in what economic analysis’s see as an effort to clean up its image in order to attract international investors. The forum comes only a week after the conclusion of the East African Community major investment conference, which has brought close to 1000 delegates from 30 countries and from regional governments of the member states of the EAC.
In addition, the Agoa forum is expected to bring to light the current position of Kenyan exports to the United States, especially at this time when the US government is concerned about the health of its citizens.
Kenya’s major exports to the US are mainly agricultural products such as coffee, tea, nuts,cut flowers, fish, pyrethrum extract and other items.
“The hosting of the forum in Kenya offers a great opportunity for American importers and investors to see and accesses first hand East Africa’s needs and challenges in regard to Agoa. In addition, the forum will build on the opportunities and deliberate on how to overcome the existing challenges, said the Trade Minister Amos Kimunya. The Minister Kimunya was upbeat saying “ It is a challenge to East African exporters to rebrand their goods so as to improve their quality. Once they attain the standard quality dictated by the market, they will be able to increase the volume of their exports as well as diversify the range of their exports.
The Minister said the government is in the process of setting up an exporter’s development fund to finance exporters, especially in small and medium business enterprises.
Statistics from the Trade Ministry show that Kenya exported goods worth more than USD 250 million to the United States under the Agoa arrangement last year compared with USD 237.7 millions in 2007.The best figure Kenya ever achieved under Agoa was in 2006 when it exported goods worth USD 262.5 million.
In contrast ,US exports to Kenya almost doubled from USD 309.13 million in 2006 to USD 557.375 million in 2007.
Ends
leooderaomolo@yahoo.com
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From: Leo Odera Omolo
Date: Mon, Jul 27, 2009 at 7:29 PM
Subject: us secretary of state leads american trade delegation to nairobi next week