EAC UNVEILS PLAN FOR INCREASED REMITTANCES FROM DIASPORA

BY GRACE MACHA IN ARUSHA

The East African Community (EAC) has begun to lay ground for  increased and formalized remittances from the Diaspora community.

Already, communication links are being enhanced with the dollar rich East Africans living abroad for the scheme.

An EAC Diaspora Policy and Plan of Action are also being developed by the Arusha-based secretariat.

"The process is supported by the International Organization for Migration (IOM)", the EAC said in a statement this week.

It includes assessing Diaspora-related information and proposing the ideal data sharing among the key stakeholders.

A meeting to review the existing legislation, policies, institutional structures and coordination mechanisms was held in Nairobi recently.

The meeting sought to gather information from the relevant ministries, departments, directorates in the partner states responsible for Diaspora matters, investment promotion and facilitation.

The regional organization, the statement said, was looking at formulating Diaspora associations by Diaspora members abroad.

In addition, the EAC is consulting with partner states and other partners on contributions from the Diaspora.

The meeting was set to conduct a regional analysis of Diaspora engagement in the seven nation EAC.

The Nairobi meeting followed a recent announcement by the EAC secretariat that it was setting a Diaspora desk to facilitate investments and trade.

The inflow of funds from the diaspora contributed largely to the bloc's FDI which stood at $8.2 billion

The facility will facilitate East Africans living in the diaspora to invest and trade in the region, among others.

Members of the Diaspora from the region living abroad have often raised a host of challenges they faced when intending to invest in the region.

These include, among others, a lack of trust in local financial institutions in their home countries, in particular.

That is despite the existing investment opportunities in the region such as agribusiness.

There had been suggestions from various quarters to establish financial institutions that can facilitate them  such as an EAC diaspora bank.

Nevertheless, he urged the Diaspora community to take advantage of EAC’s online investment guide portal (https://www.eac.int/investment-guide), which highlights investment procedures.

The EAC secretary general Peter Mathuki hastened to say recently that diaspora remittances have become "the largest source of external financing for the region".

The remittances have outpaced the Foreign Direct Investments (FDIs) the region enjoyed in recent years.

In 2021, the Kenyan diaspora remittance stood at $3.718 billion, while remittances from Uganda stood at $599.3 million.

The inflow of funds from the Tanzania diaspora stood at $569.5 million while Rwanda diaspora remitted $246 million.