Govt gives investors 8,000 acres of land

Hundreds of thousands of jobs are expected to be created as the government sets into motion a plan to acquire 12 square miles of land (close to 8,000 acres) for more industrial parks across the country, the Monitor has learnt.

While a deal has been struck between the Uganda Investment Authority (UIA) and the Office of the Prime Minister to secure up to five square miles of land for development around Nakivale in Isingiro District, several districts have already given the UIA land for the undertaking.

An anticipated one million jobs could be created through the countrywide venture which, according to UIA, hopes to attract at least 800 new factories on the land that is equivalent to 7,680 acres.

Already, the UIA has secured 511 acres of land at Omvoru in Nyaravur-Angal, Nebbi District; 500 acres at Rhino Camp in Rhino Camp Town Council, Madi-Okollo District; 1,300 acres in Yumbe Town Council, Yumbe District, and another 500 acres in Dokolo Town Council, Dokolo District.

READ: Govt to process titles for land donated for industrial parks

In Kisoro District, the authority has locked down 620 acres, received an offer for 500 acres in Mayuge, and 630 acres in Rukungiri, among others.

On Monday, Mr Morison Rwakakamba, the chairman Board of Directors of Uganda Investment Authority confirmed the developments, observing that while some districts had already processed and handed over the land titles to them, other offers were still being processed.

“Districts like Nebbi, for example, already handed us the title for the 500 acres of land, while others are offers and we are working with the respective district local governments to process those titles towards the establishment of these industrial parks,” Mr Rakakamba told Monitor.

It is understood that Lira City authorities offered UIA 300 acres, 200 acres short of the accepted minimum acreage for a park as proposed by the government.  Mr Rwakakamba said yesterday negotiations are underway with Lira for more land.

“Unfortunately, the 300 acres (the land in Lira) fell short of the criteria, so we are still negotiating with them to ensure that they give 500 acres,” Mr Rwakakamba said.

At the formation of his Cabinet in 2021, President Museveni issued 14 directives to guide his administration’s action on proposed industrial parks, amongst which was to establish 25 locations countrywide with each sub-region taking at least one park.

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To set up each of the industrial parks, Mr Museveni, according to Mr Rwakakamba, guided that each chunk of land secured should not be less than 500 acres and must be without an encumbrance of whatever sort.

“Among the criteria he issued were [a requirement] that the land should not be within a sensitive ecosystem or a wetland and that such land should be secured by UIA free of charge. When we received that guidance from the President and cabinet, we wrote to the Ministry of Local Government and the districts to find land that conforms to those criteria,” the investment chief explained.

Government’s acquisition of land seeks to drive the country’s ambitious industrialisation agenda with rapidly increasing investment needs emerging from both local and foreign investors.

In his New Year’s national address, Mr Museveni highlighted industrialisation, poverty eradication and wealth creation as key priorities of the government, pledging to stay the course for sustainable economic development and transformation.

With Uganda’s current approximated 8,000 factories that have reportedly created at least 829,600 jobs in recent years, UIA is optimistic that providing an enabling environment for investment in Uganda will smoothen Uganda’s path towards achieving its industrialisation targets.

In response to the perceived scarcity of land despite the growing interest from investors, Mr Rwakakamba said that the designated areas for industrial parks present unique advantages in terms of access to electricity, space and proximity to regional markets, compared to the existing industrial parks that face challenges ranging from biodiversity disruption and land wrangles.

“Because the new guidelines say that we must secure the land free, in some areas, some groups have been clamouring for payments and compensation for land. Also, the question of establishing these parks in wetlands has been an issue; those are the major challenges that faced the currently operating lot of parks and we want to avoid them,” he said.

ANALYSIS: Is govt's plan to build industrial parks, create more jobs on right track? 

The general principle is that all these mapped areas are viable in terms of proximity to regional markets and in terms of electricity that has now been delivered to all the regions of the country, the industrial parks will be easy to do processing and manufacturing, among others, he stated.

Whereas he said that UIA spent most of 2022 and 2023 lobbying for the land from the various district local governments, the planned industrial parks will add to the already existing parks.

“These developments are additional to the other industrial parks that are already operating. For example, we have the Jinja Industrial Park where there is Kira Motors; Soroti, Mbale, Kasese, Namanve and other privately-run industrial parks like Kapeeka, NPP in Buikwe district and several parks.”

The new proposed parks are planned to prioritise industries running agro-processing and value addition, and the manufacture of fast-moving consumer goods, including ICT. 

“Besides agro-industrialisation, we are looking at fast-consumer goods, we cannot be importing toothpaste, cooking oil, toilet rolls, sugar, matchboxes, etc. when we can produce them and those are the kind of products we should be seeing in our supermarkets, etc.,” Mr Rwakakamba said.

Monitor also learnt that each of the industrial park authorities will help investors set up manufacturing facilities for efficient and low-cost production of goods and services for both local consumption and export.

The UIA is the government authority undertaking the development of industrial and and business parks around the country aimed at creating jobs, easing accessibility of land for investments, introducing new research, technology and skills development.

The expectation is that by boosting Uganda’s exports, the UIA will contribute to enhancing Uganda’s revenue base.

So far, the UIA operates eight public business and industrial parks, including Kampala (Namanve), Luzira, Bweyogerere, Jinja, Soroti, Mbale, Kasese and Mbarara SME Park.

UIA also says it has supported the establishment of three operational private industrial parks at Kapeeka in Luweero District, and in the central region districts of Buikwe and Mukono.

About industrial parks

The last Auditor General’s audit of the Uganda Investment Authority (UIA) in 2020/21 revealed significantly low progress in the establishment of the 22 industrial parks as directed by the President in 2016, which necessitated a re-prioritisation of the intervention in the current strategic plan (2020/2021 to 2024/2025).

With a population close to 80 per cent under the age of 30 years, at least 700,000 Ugandans enter the job market every year from the country’s universities and tertiary institutions to compete for 238,000 jobs available, according to available officials statistics. 

In 2022, the Uganda Bureau of Statistics reported that at least 41 percent of Uganda’s youth, accounting for 9.3 million individuals aged between 18 and 30 were not engaged in any productive activity, according to the annual labour force survey for the period ending 2021. 

The survey also found that unemployment had increased to 12 percent up from 9 percent in 2019/20, highlighting a mismatch between the government’s industrialisation strategy – which hoped to alleviate youth unemployment -- and actual job creation.
   
 Around 31 percent of Uganda’s working-age population (14-64 years) which stood at about half the country’s total population was found to be economically inactive in 2019.

The UIA reported that up to 2,107 manufacturing businesses reported employing 150,685 Ugandans in the financial year 2021/22.