President Yoweri Museveni has said that good infrastructure is an important factor in lowering cost of production and as such it becomes crucial in the realization of profitability in doing business. He, therefore, extended an invitation to investors who are interested in doing business in Uganda that they are welcome to invest in the country especially in the areas of ago-processing, minerals and infrastructure development. He pledged the support of the Government of Uganda to entrepreneurs that are interested in doing business in the country.
The President was addressing a 2-day The Global African Infrastructure Summit (TGAIS) that opened this morning at the Savoy Hotel in Central London, UK.
The President stressed that business has two kings – the buyer and the producer/entrepreneur – who, he said, are linked by infrastructure like roads and railways, among others. He informed the meeting that with access to markets in the United States of America, India, Turkey, the European Union and China, a lot of change is taking place in Uganda in particular and the African continent in general.
The Summit which is being chaired by former President of Nigeria, Olusegun Obasanjo, is seeking to direct funds into projects across five African nations – Uganda, Ghana, Rwanda, Tanzania and Togo – as a platform to bring bankable projects to the international market represented at the TGAIS by various giants of international money market. They include pension funds, mutual funds, money managers, insurance companies, investment banks, commercial trusts and endowment funds.
Presidents John Mahama of Ghana, Paul Kagame of Rwanda and Premier Mizengo Pinda of Tanzania are also attending the Summit. There are also delegations from Togo, Cameroon, Sierra Leone, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Kenya, Somalia, Tunisia and Nigeria.
The 3 East African Community countries – Uganda, Tanzania and Rwanda – that are the main focus have, each, large infrastructure projects on the drawing board or in the early days of implementation mostly in the energy and transport sectors.
TGAIS is the only platform that brings together the public and private sectors to discuss specific transactions, access to finance and bankable projects in Sub-Saharan Africa requiring investment