President Uhuru Kenyatta will fly back to Kenya with a bag full of goodies from the United Kingdom following a historic trip gone right.
In a statement shared by the British High Commission to Kenya, the country secured various investments worth Ksh170 billion aimed at uplifting different sectors in the country as well as creating employment.
The investments would be injected in the housing and renewable energy sectors as well as expand breweries to boost employment in the country.
"Today at the UK-Africa Investment Summit in London, the UK and Kenya secured major investment deals worth over £1.3 billion (Ksh170 billion) on housing, finance, renewables, and entrepreneurship. These deals will create a new lasting partnership that will deliver more investment, jobs and growth to Kenya.
"On renewables, Kenya is set to benefit from a £30m investment in affordable energy-efficient housing, which will see the construction of 10,000 low-carbon homes for rent and sale," read part of the statement.
"An investment of £167 million by Diageo to build state of the art, environmentally friendly breweries in Kenya and wider East Africa. Diageo have already invested £120m into EABL’s Kisumu Brewery in 2017. This investment is supporting over 100,000 direct and indirect jobs (over half for women); including recruiting 15,000 new farmers taking the total number of farmers employed in their Kenyan supply chain to 45,000," continued the statement.
UK High Commissioner to Kenya Jane Marriott also pointed out that Kenyan government had represented itself well and that her country had more funding to inject into African countries that had proved to be reliable.
“The UK has a huge amount to offer ambitious African firms and we have a strong reputation for quality, integrity and reliability. Today’s Summit showcased to the world, the best of Kenyan Government, business and entrepreneurship and the partnerships today will help Kenya to continue to flourish.
“We believe that a strong, diverse, accountable private sector is key to unlocking Kenya’s economic potential and creating the jobs and opportunities Kenyans tell us they want and that UK businesses can generate,” she noted.
The UK trip was historic for the president as it provided him the unique opportunity of ringing the bell to kick off the trading of Kenya’s first green bond at the London Stock Exchange (LSE) at the first-ever UK-Africa Investment Summit.
The president opened the day’s trading at one of the world’s oldest stock exchanges, the London Stock Exchange, which culminated in the trading of the green bond by Acorn Limited.
President Kenyatta told the guests at the event that the green bonds would provide a great opportunity for African, Carribean and Pacific countries as well as those from the Caribbean and the Pacific region to access large scale capital for sustainable growth.
