Make It Kenya's Podcast: Recent Episodes
Make It Kenya
Cut flowers have placed Kenya on the map globally. We produce close to 160 million stems in 2021 and by 2022 we aim to reach 200 million stems.
In an effort to further curb the spread of the COVID-19 virus, the Kenyan government has directed all citizens to wear masks when in public spaces.
On March 30th, Kenya Fashion Council put out an appeal on social media, requesting designers and fashion industry members to share information on their capacity to produce face masks and PPEs.
Within 24 hours, the Kenya Fashion Council had received more than 800 emails from individuals and businesses. By the following day, there were 1,520 emails in total. KFCO also went ahead and created a manual for public use on the creation of a reusable cloth face mask. The same was shared with designers and tailors, enabling them to continue with a form of production and income generation in a time of crisis.
Kenya Fashion Council is working with all the relevant stakeholders to not only provide safe masks for the population but income generation strategies for its designers and tailors whose businesses have been hit hard during this pandemic.
Kenya has dispatched the first batch of avocados to China after more than three years of negotiation between the two countries.
The Agency enhances competitiveness, expansion and diversification of Kenya's exports through interventions in product development and adaptation such as product design, value-added processing, packaging, labelling, branding and enhancement of exporting skills at both sectoral and firm levels. In addition, the Agency facilitates the mainstreaming of export-oriented producer groups particularly the youth, women and other marginalised segments of the community into the export process.
In collaboration with local agencies (e.g. academia, financial institutions, research institutes) and development partners (e.g. JETRO, JICA, ITC, CBI, COMSEC, UNDP, USAID and EU), the Agency will conduct enterprise development programmes including export trade training, export coaching and market linkages for export enterprises.
Partnerships with county governments will also be pursued to create export awareness, nurture an export culture and champion the need for exports for economic development.
The Kenya Special Economic Zones Authority (SEZA) is the institution responsible for attracting, facilitating and retaining domestic and foreign direct investments in Special Economic Zones (SEZs). The Authority serves as the regulator of both public and private SEZs in Kenya and exists to create an enabling environment for investors through the development of integrated infrastructure facilities, as well as the creation of incentives that eliminate the barriers to doing business in Eastern Africa’s most vibrant economic hub.
Established in 2015 by an Act of Parliament ( Special Economic Zones Act No. 16 of 2015 ), the institution’s core objectives are:
● To provide for the establishment of special economic zones in Kenya
● The promotion and facilitation of global and local investors
● The development and management of an enabling environment for investments, and for connected purposes.
With the mandate to regulate and implement policies and programmes related to SEZs, the Government of Kenya, through SEZA, recognizes the critical role of SEZs in transforming the country into an industrialized ‘middle-income economy providing a high quality life to all its citizens as envisioned in Kenya Vision 2030
The Agency conducts research and surveys in prioritized markets to identify export opportunities.
One of our key mandates of the Agency is to have an integrated mechanism for building and enhancing the Country’s image and national identity and rallying its citizens behind it.
The Agency is tasked with the responsibility of identifying and refining the key attributes of Kenya that contribute positively to the image and reputation of the Nation and to enhance these characteristics and create an authentic and credible brand for the country that establishes our uniqueness in the global arena.
Some of the key programs aimed at establishing an authentic brand for the country include:
The Made In Kenya Brand Mark: This is a distinct and unique mark placed on locally manufactured products and services to help identify and authenticate them on local and global markets. Apart from creating competitiveness for locally produced products, it is also meant to ensure that producers take the responsibility of producing quality finished products for the local, regional and global markets.
Public service Branding: Public Service is a crucial element of transformation in line with Vision 2030 and the image of the country. The actions and attitudes of Public Servants contribute to the country’s ratings as a destination and also shape public perception of government’s performance. Vision 2030 envisages “an efficient, motivated and well-trained Public Service as one of its major foundations”.
In light of this, the Agency has developed a Public Service Branding Manual to unify the image of the entire public service and address prevailing challenges that paint public service as slow, vague, non-committal, and in the process enhance public service delivery.
This program focuses on embedding the concepts of branding and customer care into the management of Public Service. The objective is to ensure that the Public Service, which is the face government, projects the right image.
The initiative thus seeks to:
- Brand and position Public Service as a top corporate citizen.
- Provide brand identity for communication in the Government.
- Support foundations of Vision 2030 in the development of the Public Sector.
- Articulate who the public service is and what it stands for.
- Redefine a poorly defined and undifferentiated Public Service brand pictured as slow and incompetent
- Build employees’ trust and pride, while encouraging them to act as ambassadors.
- Meet the needs of an informed public who expect timely, efficient and fair access to information and service.
Make it Kenya: The ‘Make it Kenya’ is an international campaign that the Agency launched to position Kenya as the destination of choice for trade, tourism and investment globally.
This remains Kenya’s positioning statement for international markets intended to inspire pride in Kenyans while also luring business interests in Kenya and an assurance to the international community that Kenya is ready for visitors and business opportunities.
The “Make It Kenya” therefore calls upon all tourists and investors to make Kenya their destination of choice for all their needs including investment opportunities in the country to increase the country’s competitiveness on the global stage.
Buy Kenya, Build Kenya (Fashion Fridays Challenge): The Agency has been at the forefront in developing the textile and cotton industry, which are key sub-sectors in the Big 4 Development Agenda under the manufacturing sector.
The Agency launched a comprehensive online campaign dubbed ‘Kenya Fashion Fridays Challenge’ to drum up support for Kenya’s vibrant fashion industry. The initiative is aimed at rallying Kenyans to wear authentic Kenyan-made brands and designs as a break away from the official corporate attires to replace the usual casual Friday dre