Uganda trade & investment

Business Forum
At a business lunch meeting on 11 February 2010 at the Swedish residence, a small working group was established to come forward with recommendations on how to improve cooperation in the field of business co-operation and trade.

The overriding purpose with closer collaboration would be to  further enhance Swedish – Ugandan business cooperation (trade, investments, service delivery) by establishing an informal network of business enterprises - first of all to get to know each other - and with the aim to improve information sharing and cooperation on trade and investments in Uganda. 

The network could, collectively or individually, act as a source of information between and within themselves as well as a source of information and reference about the business climate and trade and investment potentials and possibilities in Uganda to Swedish interested parties, and hopefully also the other way round.

The list of Swedish related entrepreneurs and business operations was updated. The working group would present their findings well in time for the next meeting in June.

Trade and investment climate in Uganda
According to the World Bank Ease of Doing Business Report (2008), Uganda ranked 118 out of 178 countries with regard to overall ease of doing business. For the year 2007/08, Uganda was ranked 120/131 which was a deterioration from the previous year (111/ 122), with access to finance and inadequate infrastructure ranked as the most problematic factors to doing business in the country.

The burden of regulation in Uganda remains high, especially for micro, small and medium size enterprises. Nonetheless, in 2007, private investment grew to 21% of GDP, and exports increased by 15% as a result of economic diversification.

The government maintains that the private sector is the engine for economic growth, and is committed to creating an enabling environment for its development, by advocating for dynamic public-private partnerships. In this regard, it has implemented the following programmes to improve the business climate by adopting a number of measures to reduce the cost of doing business, including:

• The reduction of the energy deficit through the introduction of alternative energy sources.
• Improving the regulatory environment by passing a number of commercial policies and laws that are important for business operations, including the Tourism Act and the Biotechnology and Biosafety policy.
• Improving the efficiency of the land registry leading to reduction in the time taken to transact mortages.
• The construction of the National Data Transmission backbone connecting Kampala, Entebbe, Jinja and Bombo.

The number of procedures needed to start a business reduced from 36 days in 2006 to 17 in 2007. The government now faces the challenge of keeping up the momentum of the reform process to support private sector growth and enhance its competitiveness in global markets.

The Uganda Investment Authority (UIA) www.ugandainvest.com is a government agency whose main task is to promote and facilitate private sector investment in Uganda. It helps investors with a wide range of issues including company registration, tax related matters, immigration and work permits. A threshold of 50,000 US dollars is required as planned investment capital in order to secure an investment license for local investors, while for foreign investors it is 100,000 US dollars. Licensing for foreign investors is mandatory, for Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) tracking purposes.

To read the Post-budget Analysis 2009-2010, klick on the link to the right.