[Kenya] Government to spend Sh6b on MDG project

from The Kenya Times

By John Korir

THE government will spend Sh6.5 billion in the implementation of the Millennium Development Goals, Planning and National Development minister Henry Obwocha disclosed yesterday.

The minister said that the government was at the moment keen on implementing projects and programmes targeting pockets of poverty.

In a speech read on his behalf by an assistant minister, Ekwe Ethuro, during the official opening of a regional conference on poverty eradication at a Nairobi hotel, the minister said that the government was totally committed to matters pertaining to poverty alleviation.

The regional conference was held under the auspices of the Organization for Social Science Research in Eastern Africa ( OSSREA).The workshop brought together scientific researchers from Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Rwanda Uganda and Zambia.

Obwocha said that the poverty levels in Kenya are currently being updated by the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) through an integrated household budget survey due to be completed in the cause of the year.

He said that early efforts geared towards poverty reduction in the country include land resettlement and land reform measures and targeted rural development programmes.

In her address, Rwandan minister of state in charge of Economic Planning Mrs Nsanzabaganwa Monique said that there was need for African states to take initiatives in so far as poverty reduction in the continent was concerned.

She said’’ As a matter of fact we need to localize the foreign conception in matters pertaining to poverty eradication’’

Mrs Monique said that all initiaves must be home grown if meaningful developments were to be achieved in so far as poverty alleviation in the continent was to be achieved.

Presenters at the workshop expressed concern on the over reliance on agriculture in the African continent.

Prof. Haile Keberet from Ethiopia in his presentation said that there was need for African states to diversify their economies so as to check on effects of climate change.

On his part Prof. John Shiundu said that the continent was faced with allot of challenges which calls for concerted efforts.