HOW DO YOU LOOK AT THE GLASS?

The situation is never so dire that it can not be turned around, I don't think so, I know so!

A good start is to try and look at your situation from another perspective. A trusted friend would be useful.

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GIVE OUR TRAFFIC POLICE A CHANCE

Last week during an investor interaction Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) officials called on police to stop overriding traffic lights while directing traffic. KCCA argues that the traffic lights are large investment and it makes no sense for police to countermand them. In a classic case of “The importance of the river was not known till it dried up” on Friday the traffic police desisted from directing cars at the traffic lights leading to the worst traffic snarl-up in the city’s history. People were stuck in traffic jams around the city for hours and long into the night. Maybe it was the unhappy coincidence of the traditional Friday traffic and pre-Christmas excitement but without the traffic police directing traffic it was a mess. They made their point. It of course points to the bigger issue of a revamping of Kampala’s road network, which has remained largely the same since independence but with an exponential increase in cars in the last three...

A STITCH IN TIME

Last week the Bank of Uganda raised its key Central Bank Rate (CBR) a percentage point to ten percent from nine percent. This was the first increase in more than a year, a move prompted by BOU’s projection that price increases coming around the corner. Increasing oil prices, a weaker shilling and new taxes on mobile money services were cited as reason for this anticipated increase. We know that in the last year or so there has been a cash squeeze, money has been hard to come by. While the economy has been growing this has not been spread around evenly. It was hoped that if the economy can keep growing we can all begin to feel the joy. The Bank of Uganda has helped on this front by lowering its CBR from a high of 21 percent about seven years ago when inflation hit record levels. This allowed more borrowing by the private sector which has helped keep our economy ticking. But just when the economy was beginning to gain traction BOU has slammed on the brakes. We may ...

SOROTI FRUIT FACTORY, A POTENTIAL GAME CHANGER FOR EASTERN UGANDA

On the weekend President Yoweri Museveni commissioned the Soroti Fruit Factory, which promises to change the fortunes of fruit farmers in the Teso region. "According to reports, the factory can process 129,000 tons of fruit annually or the equivalent of 3,225 trailer loads of fruit. There are 8.2 million fruit trees in the region, if each tree produces 80kg, the 656,000 tonnes resultant production will be more than sufficient to keep the factory running well into the future. Upgrades of the plant’s capacity is foreseeable very soon.... The factory’s products – packed juices, are to be sold locally and to the region. The Teso Tropical Fruit Farmers’ Co-operative has complained that they have been receiving sh200 a kg for their produce but have seen a doubling of the price to sh500 a kg by the factory. The cooperative is a 20 percent partner in the enterprise. Government through Uganda Development Corporation (UDC) owns the remainder. The factory is a $10.2mln...

CRYPTOCURRENCIES ARE COMING, ARE WE READY?

In the last few decades in Uganda we have seen the currency become so worthless a large part of the population resorted to barter trade – exchanging goods for goods. Then the currency stabilized and we enjoyed having money in our pockets. Our money habits continue to evolve. Increasingly we don’t need physical cash to do our business. Debit cards, mobile money and e-banking services are pushing us fast towards a cashless society. And now we are moving into a more intangible space – cryptocurrency. "As I understand them these are digital currencies, generated using encryption techniques, that also verify fund transfers. Also that no central bank is involved in creating or regulating these currencies... The more widely known cryptocurrency, Bitcoin was launched in July 2010 and its fate has been at best back ground noise to many of us, if at all. it has registered some limited attention but mainly for speculative gains. In recent years it has seen ju...

COME HELP BEAT BACK HIV/AIDS

Uganda has made tremendous strides in containing the AIDS pandemic. For some of us who were around in the 1980s and saw the worst effects of the AIDS pandemic, the way the country has contained the disease is not what we had envisaged back then. Ignorance, stigma and lack of drugs surrounding the disease saw thousands die horrible deaths – wasting away, tortured by opportunistic diseases and being shirked by family and a society out fear. The doomsayers were projecting a major fall in our population, a collapse of the economy and a total breakdown of social cohesion. That the country is still around and fighting back the disease successfully, could not have been envisaged in those scary days of the 1980s when the disease came into the public conscious. Thankfully rather than sweep the problem under the carpet like many of the neighbouring countries, President Yoweri Museveni led a fight back against AIDS that had at its core widespread dissemination of infor...

PATRICK BITATURE ... TO ROAR LIKE A SIMBA

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