[kictanet] Vision 2030: The Gikomba Experience

Tue Jan 10 16:55:50 EAT 2012

Hi Mugo,

Thanks for the response, but I would like to reiterate that the Kenyan situation is like no other and therefore we need to look at how to leverage on our peculiarities and avoid the one size fits all.

As I might have mentioned there have been many initiatives for which tax payers money is sank such as the Nyayo Jua Kali Sheds, KIE sheds off Likoni Road, the workshops/training centre at the ministry of labour along Lusaka Road and man others that we could revive as a starting point towards 2030.

We need clear quick wins and visible milestones, resort cities and ports are too long term for many of us mortals to fathom which is clear from how we spend all our money in December then run for emergency loans for school fees in January.  

Setting up a design & marketing team at Gikomba or an apprenticeship program for polytechnic students at Grogan are easily achievable as short term gains, my twenty cents.  Lets not forget Moore's law when making our long term plans as if it continues to apply we shall be building cars while importing hover crafts and manufacturing silicon based components while to world will have transitioned to organic. 

In closing as you drive into Enterprise Road from Mombasa Road note the companies along the first 200 meters and you will realise that the strategy for industrialisation was already there many years ago and that its just our love for writing reports and creating new slogans that keep derailing us from the final objective.  

Regards

PS.  For those who do not want to take the drive the mentioned stretch has GM and Firestone at the entrance, Ganijee Class Marts and Meg Cushions a little further inwards, the area was intended to be a motor vehicle assembly line running from Mombasa Road to Likoni Road.

Robert Yawe
KAY System Technologies Ltd
Phoenix House, 6th Floor
P O Box 55806 Nairobi, 00200
Kenya

Tel: +254722511225, +254202010696

________________________________
 From: Mugo Kibati <mugo at vision2030.go.ke>
To: robert yawe <robertyawe at yahoo.co.uk> 
Cc: KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions <kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke> 
Sent: Tuesday, 10 January 2012, 15:22
Subject: Re: [kictanet] Vision 2030: The Gikomba Experience

Robert,

Thanks for this post - In my past life, while on the KEPSA Board I had direct responsibility for the MSME sector membership and interacted heavily with them including several visits to Gikomba where I was Impressed with a great many of the products there. You braise a valid point which merits looking at and I have my team already reviewing it. A visit by the Vision 2030 team is in the works.

Vision 2030 is a homegrown plan which has nevertheless benchmarked and taken lessons from several countries that have successfully developed and implemented their own homegrown development plans. It however is not beyond further input and adjustments and the next few months will provide ample opportunity for that.

Mugo

Sent from my iPad

On 9 Jan 2012, at 13:50, robert yawe <robertyawe at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:

Hi Listers,
>
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>At the beginning of the year and visited Gikomba to see if I could get a basket ball backboard fabricated and task that was executed within an hour.
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>Apart from the efficiency and flexibility with which is was done my experience re-affirms by believe that the Vision 2030 and no more a shelf document than the Sessional Paper number 3 I believe of 1968 was.
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>I ask Mr. Kibati and his team to visit Gikomba and also Grogan (where a car is reconditioned in 8 hours flat), spend at least 2 hours after which you will be in a position to give sight to Vision 2030.
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>Gikomba and Grogan epitomise what the vision was of the Kenya Industrial Estates workshops in Industrial Areas where supposed to be and also the later Nyayo Jua Kali Sheds but with the missing ingredient, the peculiar Kenyan. 
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> 
><image003.jpg>    
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>This is a picture of the average stalls in Gikomba, I visited 3 speciality workshops before the backboard was finally completed, each stall measures no more than 3 x 5 meters.  The picture above is of a stall with a wood planner, circular saw and router.  Each of the stalls usually accommodates a number of independent contractors with the usual broker offering the logistics and coordination function
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><image004.jpg>
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>As the demand for space increases the stalls have now been extended to two levels and a few new constructions have risen to 3 and 4 storeys. 
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>The two locations apply all the rules of Just I Time and as an engineer you will appreciate the clustering of various activities in the form of a conveyor belt system.
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>To me what I visualised was the Airbus manufacturing model where components are assembled in disparate locations.
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>Let as be weary of picking a foreign model on industrialisation without localising it and taking into account the fact that Kenya is a different country and 2013 is not 1967 so the Asian Tiger models or the MIT models will fail here, we must incorporate our local peculiarities if we are to succeed.
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>Regards
>
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