Then he will move to create new plants
through domestic and foreign direct investments. The president’s
industrialization promise augur well with the move China government
wants to relocate 500 industries in the next five years to Tanzania.
The 500 program supposed to start with
100 industries yearly where the Export Processing Zone Authority has
been given directives to prepare logistics and other related
infrastructure. Despite the initial directive, the exercise faces number
of hurdles, which includes infrastructure, skills in human resources
and corruption.
The Chinese Embassy in Tanzania, Chief
Economic and Commercial Representative, Mr Lin Zhiyong, said the project
faces some challenges before tangible outcomes are realised. “So far no
factory has been relocated to Tanzania...as there are some challenges
to be addressed first,” Mr Lin said. Tanzanian Ambassador to China, Lt
General (rtd) Abdulrahaman Shimbo, also pinpoint hurdles the country
faces on hosting these industries.
“The coming of these industries is a
challenge in terms of our preparedness to welcome these investors,” Amb,
Shimbo said. Therefore, the president’s pledge to be implemented fully
these three challenges—corruption, infrastructure and manpower
skills—have to be solved amicably.
The main point here is to build
favourable infrastructure that will house all those factories, which
some of them might target domestic and foreign markets or one of the
two.
This means the authority should
demarcate special area—call it Special Economic Zones (SEZ), business
parks or even turning a whole district or region to cater for these
industries. In the past, I had argued that Lindi is a vast region to be
turned into an industrial hub of this country. Lindi has plenty of land.
This is based on the fact that it is
some 500 kilometers from Dar es Salaam—the business hub of Tanzania and
where a big port is situated. Also the region has natural port
protruding from the estuary shore of Lukuledi (Lindi) River, which needs
to be developed and act as exporting gate to the world.
And the natural gas, which is additional
advantage, for generating power—much needed for industries and another
source of energy for factories which productions consist of burning or
boiling of raw materials.
The human skills—especially industrial
technicians— this is an ongoing process which needs to update and
increase student intakes in more specific subjects like Gas, Oil, IT and
the like. On top of that Lindi is very close to Mtwara which is
expanding very fast following discovering of natural Gas. That region
also will need industrial goods for its new residents—Lindi will supply
that.
Moreover, Lindi stands as a sample to
house these 500 hundred factories. Some still could be relocated to
other regions given their comparative and competitive advantages.
If these factors are relocated to
Tanzania, they are surely going to change the industry sector landscape
and put the nation at different wave length with neighbours. Imagine if
one factory out of 500 creates 1,000 direct employments, this translates
500,000 jobs. Think about exports and taxes all these factories are
going to produce in the country this is not a child’s joke.
But all dreams will come true should the
level of corruption and red tapes in the process of relocating these
factories are curbed. Otherwise, business persons regardless which
country he/she comes from dislike corruption and red tapes. And no one
is ready to face such challenges— instead better look for another
country.
As Mr Lin said: “I am not satisfied with
these (China’s FDIs) figures, are too small.” Because last year Beijing
FDIs to Dar es Salaam clocked 4.0 billion US dollars and was growing
fast.
On that background, the authorities have
a huge task to work upon, ranging from skilled labour, infrastructure,
red tapes and corruption, to work on before industrialisation dream
takes shape.
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