Kisumu hosts 9th Africities Conference

The Lakeside City of Kisumu was in carnival mood last week as it played host to the 9^th Africities conference. The event provides a great opportunity for peer learning on the management of cities and local authorities in Africa. This should be the go-to event for lessons in the development and management of cities and municipalities. It brings together key actors at policy and technical level. Great opportunity to identify and seek solutions to contemporary urban governance challenges facing the continent.

These conferences have been happening for a while now. But are African states, cities and municipalities using them to learn and do things differently? Do we see gradual improvements in our urban governance? I hope that some participants in Kisumu picked useful lessons to inform the United Nations Agenda 2030 and the African Union Agenda 2063. I am certain that Kisumu City, and host country Kenya, drew some obvious social-economic benefits from the event, and seized the local and international limelight to position for future business. However, whether the country delegations to these conferences apply the lessons learnt on return remains moot.

Youth and farming

A while back, I side chatted one of the South African large-scale farmers on the sidelines of an international event in London. He shared a simple story. His children had all shunned farming and left it to him. Until he introduced technology. He harnessed technology on his machinery to sow, cultivate, operate the irrigation gear and harvest. He used drones to apply pesticides over the vast farm, saving time and rigour. All centrally coordinated from his farm offices. One of his sons took interest and sought to be involved. Some others followed. They later took over.

It was therefore curious to notice that the use of ineffective farming technology is cited as one of the reasons for low agricultural productivity in the study on land fragmentation by the national land commission discussed on this column recently. The study reveals that the majority of respondents used hand-held tools such as jembes, pangas and sickle, among others, to till land. This is tough and unattractive. Like in the above case, our youth will shun it. The study identifies land consolidation as one of the strategies that could be considered to augment land sizes to make them amenable to mechanization. The use of existing regulatory organs such as land control boards to protect productive farm holdings from fragmentation into unviable sizes is another.

The second team of commissioners to the land commission are just over two years in office now. They were sworn in by former Chief Justice David Maraga in November 2019. But not many can name its chair, vice-chair and commissioners. But by its first year, many in the land sector would have named most members of the first commission, whose tenure expired in February 2019. It had assumed office in February 2013. Why? Because the engagement styles of the two teams of commissioners are notably different.

New commissioners focused on results

The first commission engaged abrasively, and publicly. Graphic details of its internal squabbles, and those with the Lands Ministry and the rest of the government, went public. I remember once quipping that the media must have retained an office next door. The style strained relations with some key partners, undermined production and tainted the commission’s image. As it handed over office, the first land commission was publicly shamed, with some of its commissioners and officers having been charged in court for diverse reasons. Being the inaugural commission, this was not good history, much as the sister Lands Ministry may have been guilty for not dutifully nurturing its first constitutional baby.

Debate on accreditation

The debate on the accreditation of professional courses was rekindled recently. This followed remarks allegedly made by the Registrar of the Engineers Registration Board of Kenya during a meeting with the Committee on Education and Research of the National Assembly. Impression was made that several engineering courses currently offered by some local universities have not been accredited and, therefore, enlisted students may not be registrable for professional practice on graduation. There’s been previous related discussion on other professional courses. The divergence isn’t good for Kenya.

Industry gives good feedback

Market hype after 2013 launch

When the then President Mwai Kibaki launched the Konza Technology City in January 2013, real estate investors trooped in there. Local brokers were even faster in pitching at the nearby Malili market center to cash in on the anticipated land market. Perhaps all were then unaware about the details and pathway to establishing such an intricate private public partnership venture. Speculative land purchases don’t quite apply.

Need for support infrastructure