Posted on January, 30, 2019 at 08:21 am
By Noven Owiti
The government plans to undertake regional zoning meant to spur industrial growth, Industry, Trade and Co-operatives Cabinet Secretary Peter Munya has said.
He said the government in partnership with the African Development Bank is working on a plan to zone agro-processing regions especially in the rural areas across the country.
The zoning, he said, is targeting Kisumu, Nakuru and Mombasa counties as major industrial hubs with a view to improving the country’s agro-processed products for export.
Munya said already the ministry is working on a strategy that seeks to bring on board the counties to the proposed plan of promoting agro-processing.
“The main objective is to incorporate counties in the national government’s agenda of driving industrialisation which forms a major contributor to the country’s economy,” he said.
“Part of our strategy in the industrialisation is to identify specific value chains that we want promote as we endeavour to drive the growth of the sector,” he added during a tour of Kenya Breweries Ltd (KBL) plant in Kisumu yesterday ahead of its opening.
The CS said the government is at an advanced stage of introducing Bt cotton as part of efforts to revive cotton production.
He said the new variety developed after elaborate research would boost cotton production hence catalise the revival of cotton factories such as the collapsed Kisumu Cotton Mills (KICOMI), which will be a textile hub.
Cotton ginneries
Munya revealed that the department of co-oporatives is planning a strategy on revival of cotton ginneries and co-operatives that were driving the crop’s production in the region.
“We are done with Rivertex in Eldoret, which is up and running. We want to expand that success in western Kenya region,” he said, adding that plans are underway to revive the leather production in the country.
He said upon its completion and launch the Sh15 billion KBL investment is expected not only to be a booster to the region’s economic growth but also major contributor to the national government’s manufacturing and industrialisation agenda.
“It is a transformation that is contributing to the government agenda of growing gross domestic product (GDP) share of manufacturing from nine per cent to 15 per cent,” said the CS.
KBL Managing director Jane Karuku said the multi-billion-shilling plant is on schedule and will open its doors for production in a few weeks with test-production currently ongoing.
Source: MediaMax Network