Strategy design for boosting competitiveness and trade flows in East Africa’s Northern Transport Corridor

Transport corridor
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Situation

Experience from supporting trade development in the previous five years helped the client, a multi-donor-funded trade development organization, realize that to achieve lasting trade development outcomes, it is essential to not only focus on reducing barriers to trade but also bolster networks among businesses and suppliers, including smallholder farmers located in East Africa’s Northern Transport Corridor. 

This meant supporting private sector growth, expanding high-potential market systems, and improving gender inclusion within the trade corridor. To this end, the client decided to develop a comprehensive Growth Hub Program Strategy for Uganda and Kenya. Growth Hubs or Growth Poles have proven effective in stimulating value creation and increasing trading response by the private sector, thereby creating development impact through improved incomes and jobs—and resiliency.

Industries
Strategy, Data & Insights
Public Policy
Program Design & Business Development
Agribusiness & Food Systems
Cities & Infrastructure
Economic Growth & Trade
Engagement

ORI supplied an expert team comprising a team leader, a trade economist, and data analysts for the 9-month engagement. We conducted extensive data collection, research and analysis and applied market systems approach to value chain assessments. We engaged circa 60 stakeholders from across Kenya and Uganda, including local/municipal governments, national government, and agencies—to local communities, political leaders, civil society, think tanks, private sector, traders, smallholder farmers, large commercial farmers, and development agencies, among others.

ORI supported the client to:

  • Frame the problem and arrive at a universe of likely interventions for sectors with the highest potential for trade competitiveness in selected secondary cities.
  • Apply a mix of approaches and tools, including spatial analysis, cross-border trade analysis, and nighttime light (NTL), among others, to identify nodes of economic activity concentration and to pinpoint growth hub locations.
  • Investigate the synergies and linkages between local industries, value chains, and market systems, then identify the backward and forward linkages between them.
  • Pinpoint locations on the East African Northern Transport Corridor where catalytic investment would have the most significant return—across economic growth and broad-based development impact.
  • Design, confirm, and cost interventions; complete a gender analysis, a cost-benefit analysis, a political economy analysis, and a value-for-money assessment.
  • Shortlist, select, and prioritize attractive sectors from a longlist—within agribusiness and trade with the highest potential to deliver inclusive growth and incentivize women’s and youth's inclusion.
  • Evaluate the scope for improving connectivity within the hub regarding trade and information flows and transport linkages to increase access to markets, strengthen trading relationships, and spread growth.
Outcomes
  • A rigorous Project Appraisal Report was completed describing a vetted set of growth hub sites in secondary cities that were selected based on objective criteria.
  • The client utilized the Project Appraisal Report to finalize the design of a high-quality program and communicate a compelling trade-to-impact case. This facilitated fundraising efforts with donors and governments for this highly innovative multi-country program.
  • Preliminary investment commitments were secured from the private sector and county/local governments for co-investment in sector-enabling infrastructure.
  • Local asset base—primarily in the form of crucial infrastructure improvements around transport, logistics, storage, electric power, and human capital were identified, alongside opportunities for leveraging and building on these assets to support businesses in generating a robust response to improvements in the trading environment.