Efforts to attract Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) by East African community leaders and technocrats seem to be paying off.

In 2019, for example, according to Attractiveness Survey 2019 report by Ernest and Young (EY), trillions of shillings have flowed to the community which has resulted into the creation of thousands of jobs. That is good news already considering the fact that the region suffers from chronicle unemployment especially among the youth.

Ethiopia, the EY report says, attracted investment worth Shs26.8 trillion leading to the creation of 16,000 jobs while Kenya attracted Shs7.68 trillion accounting for the almost 6000 jobs created.

And in Tanzania, 3000 jobs were also created from Foreign Direct Investments worth Shs3.8 trillion during the same period. Although the 2019 report did not account for investments for Uganda and Rwanda, available statistics at the Bank of Uganda indicate that Shs2.9 trillion in FDIs flowed to Uganda resulting in the creation of 6,000 new jobs.

How will the region continue to attract and sustain this positive FDIs trend which has proved to be a significant source of employment creation opportunities, revenue for government and import substitutions?

That is the exact reason why Human Capital International, has assembled the crème de la crème at the 2nd Kampala Strategic Leaders’ Summit to enable governments and SMEs devise means of not just sustaining the continuous flow of FDIs into the region but to fine tune the policies, strategies and processes of mining the opportunities from FDIs into the region.

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Even as you wait for the 27^th of February, the Summit day at Sheraton Hotel Kampala, Mr Gideon Badagawa, one of the panellists at the Summit points out that there are “some fundamental must do things” that have led to the flow of FDIs into the region which must be maintained.

“What is selling the region is a combined market of 177 million people. We need to continue opening up this market such that irrespective of the siting of the investments; whether in Uganda, Kenya or Rwanda, the investor will have no difficulties accessing the markets in other EAC countries,” Mr Badagawa says.

Since the region is competing for investors just like other parts of the world, Mr Badagawa stressed in a pre-summit interview that the region should maintain the liberal nature of the economies until that time when local investors have the capital to do what foreign investors are doing.

“Investors want to be in a place where they are sure of their security and investment as well the ease to repatriate their investments without any restrictions. This is good if we are to continue promoting our region as top investment destination,” he adds.

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The Executive Director of the Private Sector Foundation Uganda advises policy makers within the region to enact policies that are aimed at empowering and building the capacities of the local citizenry to get the necessary skills “so that the jobs created, go to our people without importing such expertise and talents”

So how can SMEs housed in different city suburbs within Uganda benefit from this tremendous flow of investment into the region? To get answers to this question, I invite you to book your participation and be part of the hundreds that will attend this years’ Summit. The conference will address other topics such as; ICT implications on entrepreneurs and enterprises, how SMEs can benefit from the recently signed African Continental Free Trade Agreement, the Relevance of Corporate Governance in SME growth in the Emerging Markets, and the Future of Women (CEO) in Corporate Leadership.

Be part of this interesting ideas packed discussions at the summit.