KAMPALA, UGANDA: The Uganda Investment Authority (UIA) has drawn a new Strategic Plan 2020/21-2024/25 in which the Agency is planning to increase the value of new domestic investments to US$1 billion by the year 2025.
“This will be an increase from US$328.7 million worth of investment projects attracted in 2018/19 and will result into the creation of 369,317 direct jobs,” said the Authority’s Director for Finance and Administration, Barbara Kabuchu.
This was at the Development Policy and Investment Promotion retreat that was held at Serena hotel in Kigo from the 30th of September to the 2nd of October 2020.
She said the new strategic plan also aims at increasing foreign direct investment (FDI) percentage contribution to the gross domestic product (GDP) from the current 3.68% to 5% by 2025 resulting in the creation of 196,075 direct jobs.
The Authority is also increasing the contribution to GDP of existing and new SMEs facilitated by UIA from Ush 917 million to Ush1.477 trillion which will be a 10% increase by 2025.
This will enable the Authority to contribute towards the 24% of the annual jobs created by the Small and Medium enterprises (SMEs) in Uganda. The third National Development Plan (NDPIII) targets 1,540,000, jobs to be created by SMEs by 2025.
The Authority will also promote SME investment through Business Development Services, linkages and platforms for innovation and technology transfer:
“We want to place Uganda among the Top 5 African countries ranked for “Ease of Doing Business” and to improve Uganda’s Competitiveness ranking from the current 137 to 110 by 2025,” she said adding that the Authority plans to enhance and develop a regional network of service industrial and business parks for employment generation, value addition, technology advancement and knowledge transfer.
She explained that the UIA strategic objectives are linked to the eleven programs of the Third National Development Plan and these include: Private Sector Development, Manufacturing, Agro-Industrialization, Mineral Development and Tourism Development. Others are Water, Climate Change, and Environment Management, Sustainable Energy and ICT Development and Sustainable Urbanization and Housing.
Mrs Kabuchu explained that UIA has been given a big role through the law-The Investment Code (2019) and that Ugandans had a lot of expectations from the Authority.
“The Authority will fully harness its strengths and opportunities to ensure successful implementation of the planned interventions to deliver the NDPIII,” she told the delegates.
She said the Authority had made several achievements in the last five years including new investments that generated under 150,000[FE1] direct jobs (14.8%) of the 1,000,000 jobs projected.
The One-Stop Centre (OSC) has grown from three agencies stationed at UIA in 2016 (URA, URSB, DCIC), to 16 agencies and now handles over 40,000 transactions per year, exceeding the FY 19/20 target of 30,000; In the NDP111 period, UIA will extend One Stop Centres to four region in Uganda, to facilitate Investors away from Kampala.
Five online services have been launched on UIA’s e-Biz Platform. These include e-business registration, land title verification, online investment licensing, application for Environmental Impact Assessment and online payment.
UIA has also established 10 partially serviced industrial parks in Namanve, Luzira, Bweyogerere, Soroti, Kasese, Karamoja, Jinja, Koboko Mbarara SME and Mbale with a total acreage of 3993 acres.
These are accommodating 148 operational industries and 42 SMEs out of the total projected 584 industries at full capacity. Collectively UIA so far created 26000 direct jobs in the Government owned Industrial parks and another 120,000 indirect jobs along the value chains.
UIA has also successfully attracted investment in five private industrial parks in Liaoshen Kapeeka Industrial Park, Buikwe MMP industrial park, Lugazi Industrial Park, Tian Tang Mbalala industrial parks and Kato Aromatic Industrial Park Mukono. They have an additional 23 operational industries with a total direct employment of 1620 direct jobs and 6500 jobs along the value chain.
Mrs Kabuchu announced the Authority’s big plans of establishing an SME database with 3 million SMEs on the system. The SMEs would be facilitated to grow from SMEs to Investors [FE2] in the short to medium term. She said that plans for this project were already underway.
By David Muwanga
