20 Mar 2016

Kenya will be the first African state to host the Sixth Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD) from August 17 to 28 this year.

In an interview with the Kenyan High Commissioner to Botswana, who is also the special representative to the Southern African Development Community (SADC), Ms Jean Kimani said it would be the first TICAD conference to be  hosted outside Japan and the first in Africa.

She said the decision to alternate venues of the summit between Japan and Africa was reached at the TICAD V meeting in Japan, and that the decision to identify the African state to host TICAD VI was taken at the 26th ordinary session of the African Union held in January this year where Kenyan President, Mr Uhuru Kenyatta announced that his country was ready to host.

Ms Kimani said TICAD was initiated by Japan in 1993 to serve as a policy forum for African development and aims at drawing international attention and urgency to African development issues while paying attention and urgency to Africa’s ownership of the process.

She said TICAD VI would create an opportunity for Africa’s business executives and Japanese counterparts to participate in a high level dialogue with heads of states and government on ways to enhance the African business environment.

The high commissioner said TICAD VI in Africa comes hot on the heels of the Africa Agenda 2063 framework, and said Agenda 2063 focuses on trends, challenges and opportunities in the next 50 years with a shared strategic framework for inclusive growth and sustainable development and a global strategy to optimise the use of Africa’s resources for the benefit of all Africans.

For his part, the Japanese Ambassador to Botswana, Mr Masahiro Onishi said since the inception of TICAD, his government has developed many activities under the TICAD initiative. He said in five years since 2008, the government of Japan built 1 321 elementary and middle schools, improved 4 778 healthcare and medical facilities and provided safe water to an additional 10.79 million people in Africa.

Mr Onishi said as for Botswana, according to the Yokohama plan in TICAD V, the government of Japan has dispatched experts to improve customs administration in and that they have been assisting Botswana government in order to develop a natural forest monitoring system as a technological cooperation.

He said in addition to the above assistance to Botswana, Japan has been providing regular scholarship programme by Japanese government, and that now, some students from Botswana were studying in Japanese universities to get their master’s degree followed by internship in Japanese companies all  under the Yokohama Plan.

Regarding TICAD VI being held in Africa for the first time, Mr Onishi said since TICAD has been held every five years, it would be held every three years from now onwards, and said this would benefit Africa as it was attended by different participants from different organisations which he said would give Africans an opportunity to engage participants in open and fruitful discussions on African development. Ends