Latest News

Building together for Uganda, UK mutual prosperity (New Vision)

Last week, I returned to Uganda, ,
my country of birth, in my role – ‘^
as the UK Prime Minister’s
Trade Envoy, with the aim of
continuing to build the UK’s future
trade relationship with this great
nation.
The COVID-19 pandemic has hit
both our economies hard, but signs of
recovery are on the horizon in Uganda,
reiterating the strength and resilience
of this country and its people.
As we enter a new era of
international relations, the UK is
building connections with countries
with great potential, which is why
we are more determined than ever to
become Uganda’s partner of choice for
trade and investment.
The UK is proud to be one of
Uganda’s biggest donor partners,
but we have greater ambitions. If
Uganda is to achieve middle-income
status, we need to focus on building
trade and exports that will deliver
long term, sustainable growth in a
climate smart way. However, it is not
as simple as marketing Uganda as the ‘next big thing’ to potential investors
and waiting for the money to roll in.
Support is required at every level, and
our approach is to build capacity from
s^allholder farmers, right up to large
co^mercial entities.
Agriculture is the backbone of
Uganda’s economy and has huge
potential regionally and across the
globe, but productivity lags behind
othdtt countries in Africa.
The UK has been working to grow
the agribusiness sector through helping
farmers and small and medium
enterprises (SMEs) improve climate
resilience, access affordable finance,
and connect to the regional and global
market.
In turn, strong SMEs are just as
important to Uganda’s growth. A
thriving SME sector is the key to every
successful economy. One issue that
has plagued business is scalability,
hindered largely by the crippling
cost of borrowing. The UK funded
programmes such as AgDevCo to
provide technical expertise and
concessional finance to businesses in agriculture. This has helped SMEs
reduce the risk associated with
expansion, leading to greater output,
job creation, climate smart solutions
and sustainable development in the
communities in which they work. This leads on naturally to support
for large-scale projects. Uganda has
many willing suitors, but not all
have Uganda’s interests at heart. The
UK has a track record of delivering
quality projects and value for money
to the people of Uganda. The UK
government’s development finance
institution CDC Group and UK
supported Private Infrastructure
Development Group (PIDG) have a
long history of concessional investment
in Uganda.
UK Government Export Finance
(UKEF) is globally respected for the
excellent credit terms offered to eligible
investment deals, and in Uganda many
large deals have benefitted from the
competitive terms.
Together, this collective mutual
prosperity offer has raised over 680,000
Ugandans’ incomes; supported 750,000
to cope with the effects of climate
change; and brought over $790m
worth of investment into Uganda.
This investment is building Hoima
airport. Lake Victoria marine transport,
Namanve Industrial Park, solar agricultural water pumping systems,
5/o of Uganda’s electricity supply
(through private investment) and many
more Ugandan priorities.
This investment is supporting
Ugandan private businesses, UK
businesses and the Government of
Uganda priorities.
• Why is the UK investing so heavily
in Uganda? The answer is simple:
Uganda’s prosperity equals UK
prosperity. We are strengthening our
connections with the world’s fastestgrowing
economies in order to build
a network of trade and investment
partners that deliver for all. Increased
trade between the UK and Uganda will
deliver more jobs, increased exports,
and technology transfer.
As I spent the week meeting with
business and government, I emphasised
the point that now is the time to build
long-term trusted partnerships, and the
UK is playing a leading role in building
the foundations for a prosperous future.