Cape Town, home to Table Mountain, African penguins, sunshine and sea, is a world-renowned tourist destination. But it could also become famous for being the first major city in the world to run out of water.

Most recent projections suggest the its water could run out as early as March. The crisis has been caused by three years of very low rainfall, coupled with increasing consumption by a growing population.

The local government is racing to address the situation, with desalination plants to make sea water drinkable, groundwater collection projects, and water recycling programmes.

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Meanwhile Cape Town’s four million residents are being urged to conserve water and use no more 87 litres (19 gallons) a day. Car washing and filling up swimming pools has been banned. And the visiting Indian cricket team were told to limit their post-match showers to two minutes.

Such water-related problems are not confined to Cape Town, of course.

Nearly 850 million people globally lack access to safe drinking water, says the World Health Organisation, and droughts are increasing.

So it seems incredible that we still waste so much of this essential natural resource. In developing and emerging countries, up to 80% of water is lost through leakages, according to German environmental consultancy GIZ. Even in some areas of the US, up to 50% of water trickles away due to ageing infrastructure.

A growing number of technology companies are focusing their work on water management – applying “smart” solutions to water challenges.

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For example, French company CityTaps is on a mission to streamline water access in urban homes with its smart water meters linked to an internet-based management system.

The company is first targeting poor homes in urban areas and its system, CTSuite, is currently being trialled in Niger.

Users buy “water credits” via their mobile phones and a smart meter dispenses only as much water as has been paid for. Users receive alerts when their credit balance gets low, and if they don’t top up the account, the meter automatically switches off the flow.

The utility can track water usage remotely in near real-time via the internet. A sudden spike in water outflow and a change in pressure, measured by “internet of things” sensors, can then help identify leaks across the network.

Water companies are also using drones and satellites to help spot leaks, and in some circumstances even divining rods – despite scientific doubts, some firms say they do work.

“The internet of things offers new avenues for technological innovation in the water field, mostly by providing real-time data that – we hope – can be used to help utilities become ever more efficient and high-performing,” says Gregoire Landel, chief executive of CityTaps.

Better water management also helps save on the electricity and chemicals required to produce drinkable water.

Meanwhile, other companies are using technology to harvest water from new sources.

US-based WaterSeer, for example, is developing a device capable of collecting water from the air.

An internal fan draws air into an underground collection chamber where the vapour condenses, making use of the earth’s cooler temperatures. Solar or electricity grid-powered coolers also help the condensation process.

The company says water can be produced with “less than a 100 watts” of electricity – the power requirement of an old-fashioned light bulb.

“Individuals and businesses will pave the way for innovative solutions, as they will be able to move and adopt a series of them quicker than large utilities that are sometimes mired in regulatory constraints and rigid decision-making cultures,” says Nancy Curtis, a founding partner of WaterSeer.

“However, utilities offer the opportunity to make large-scale impacts on replenishing depleting water supplies.”

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A number of water-restricted municipalities in the US are exploring how WaterSeer devices could be used to improve water security, the company says. But the device is still being tested in the field, so these are early days.

“A community of 500 would save 40 million US gallons (150m litres; 33m gallons) of water or more each year, reducing stress on traditional surface and underground sources,” argues Ms Curtis.

Technology may have its place in helping us use water more efficiently, but it is unlikely to have much impact on those without any access to water in the first place, says Alexandros Makarigakis of Unesco’s international hydrological programme (IHP).

“Smart water systems cannot be expected to have much impact regarding provision of access for the unconnected. [They] are more effective in the urban context,” he says.

This is echoed by Vincent Casey, senior manager at the charity WaterAid.

“The technology to connect people to a water supply has been around since ancient Egypt. It’s not a technical problem,” he says.

More important is how water supplies are organised, he argues, which is an issue primarily for governments, with support from the private sector.

“The priority is mobilising resources and paying sufficient attention to the management arrangement to keep people connected,” says Mr Casey.

That’s not to say WaterAid eschews tech completely. It has successfully used mobile app mWater to monitor water access and existing networks.

For those with no direct-to-home supply, services like Grundfos’ “water ATM”, which enables people to access water from a local dispenser using a pre-paid card, are also proving useful.

But there is a sense that much of this technology is merely tinkering at the edges. The overarching issue is the potentially devastating effect of global warming on water availability and how we, collectively, endeavour to tackle it.

Source: Gabriella Mulligan,Technology of Business reporter

ZIMBABWEAN telecoms, media and financial services tycoon, Strive Masiyiwa, is now worth US$1.7 billion and ranked 14th on Forbes’ list of African billionaires.

According to the US-based business magazine, Masiyiwa becomes Zimbabwe’s first billionaire and the country’s only representative on its list of Africa’s super rich.

Masiyiwa, a globally respected business leader and philanthropist, is executive chairman of the Econet Group which was founded in 1993 with the launch of mobile phone company Econet Wireless Zimbabwe after a five-year legal battle against the Harare government.

His telecoms venture has since expanded internationally with operations now spanning Africa as well as in Europe, South America, North America and the East Asia Pacific Rim.

Listed on the local stock market, Econet Wireless Zimbabwe is one of the country’s biggest corporations with interests now extending beyond telecoms to financial services, insurance, e-commerce, renewable energy, education, Coca-Cola bottling, hospitality and payment gateway solutions.

Another unit of the Econet Group, Liquid Telecom Group, successfully raised $700 million in a bond and term loan financing package from international financiers.

In addition, Masiyiwa has since moved into media with pay television firm Kwese TV, which is already operating in several African countries.

Masiyiwa serves on a number of international boards, including Unilever, Rockefeller Foundation, the Council on Foreign Relations’ Global Advisory Board, the Africa Progress Panel and the UN Secretary General’s Advisory Board for Sustainable Energy.

Along with his wife Tsitsi, the telecoms tycoon also runs the Higher Life Foundation which pays the school fees of over 40,000 students across the Primary, High school and Tertiary education levels.

Meanwhile, at the top of Forbes list of Africa’s super rich is Nigerian Aliko Dangote who is worth $12.2 billion dollars followed by South Africa’s Nicky Oppenheimer who is said to be worth US$7.7 billion.

Only two women make the 23-name list of Africa’s billionaires with Angola’s Isabel Dos Santos in ninth place with a net-worth of $2.7 billion.

Nigerian oil entrepreneur is the other female entrant on the list Folorunsho Alakija at US$1.6 billion.

Source: Allafrica

The East African Crude Oil Pipeline is has already been completed and it holds great opportunities businesses can benefit from.

Among the partners that played a role to make the construction successful include China National Offshore Oil Corporation Uganda, Tullow Oil Uganda, Total E&P Uganda and American firm Gulf Interstate Engineering.

Other development partners are Uganda National Oil Company and the Tanzania Petroleum Development Corporation.

The export pipeline will serve the East African Community (EAC) states as an integral component to boost trade.

The firm has invited local companies dealing in engineering, procurement and construction to grab the opportunities that will be available after the conclusion of the project. They will be able to invest in there sectors and enhance their growth.

With the final investment set to be made on the pipeline, Gulf Interstate Engineering has invited firms to a conference to discuss various business opportunities they can invest in to bolster the economy of the country.

The crude oil export pipeline from the Albertine Graben to Tanga Port in Tanzania will as well be improved.

The 1445km long and 24-inch diameter pipeline is set to be the world’s longest heated crude oil pipeline, which will effectively serve the country’s waxy oil in nature.

Source: allafrica.com

Abuja — The country’s electricity supply situation is set to improve as the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, yesterday, said it had concluded repair works on the Escravos-Lagos Pipeline, ELP, and gas supply had been restored to the affected power plants.

The NNPC, in a statement by its Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division, Mr. Ndu Ughamadu, said the speedy repair of the pipeline followed the directive by the Group Managing Director, Mr. Maikanti Baru, to carry out an assessment of the damage with a view to promptly resolving same.

After years of economic mismanagement a new, if restrained, sense of optimism has gripped Angola as the actions of the country’s fledgling president start to suggest that change may be possible.

Upon taking the helm of Africa’s second-largest oil producer, João Lourençosurprised many by immediately starting to dismantle the patronage networks of his predecessor, Eduardo dos Santos. Making it clear he is no puppet, he has also broken with a number of long-standing policies, especially with regard to economic and foreign policy.

A real change of direction would be a welcome in a country reeling in the wake of years of kleptocracy and suffering from high levels of public debt, unemployment and inflation. Yet politics and economics often go hand in hand in Angola and the real significance of Lourenço’s changes is not yet apparent.

“I think its unclear at present to what extent these are just moves against the dos Santos clique or if they are more substantive moves to diversify and open up the economy,” says Claudia Gastrow, Angola expert at the University of Johannesburg.

Reforms

A number of economic reforms and bold political manoeuvres suggest a change of course for Angola. Dismissals have come thick and fast since Lourenço entered office in late September, starting with the chief of police and the head of the intelligence service, and culminating with the dismissal of the former president’s daughter, Isabel dos Santos, as head of the national oil company, Sonangol.

Many of the new faces hail from the barracks. Lourenço served as defence minister and is heavily associated with the military. The overhaul, however, has not been absolute and his cabinet reflects the delicate tightrope Lourenço must walk between old dos Santos loyalists and his own cadres.

Perhaps his real focus is on the economy, as Lourenço himself has suggested. In the run-up to the election, he described himself to a local journalist not as the Gorbachev of Angola but as its Deng Xiaoping – an economic rather than a political reformer.

This statement certainly bears some weight in the current context. Lourenço has opened up the Angolan business space in a variety of ways that contrast starkly with Angola’s former isolationist policies. For example, Angola will allow a fourth mobile operator to enter its profitable telecoms sector.

“We are increasing competition to improve the service, and will work on pricing and quality of service,” says telecoms minister José Carvalho da Rocha.

Movicel and Unitel are currently the largest providers and both are partly state-owned. In another liberalising move, Lourenço quickly visited Jacob Zuma in South Africa in order to bolster bilateral cooperation, and the two countries have agreed to scrap visas for all passport holders.

“In the past there was almost a protectionist stance regarding South Africa and this has shifted,” says South African political analyst Paula Cristina Roque. “It’s unheard of and it’s going to bring incredible opportunities by increasing the possibility of regional trade.” Another inhibitor to inclusive Angolan growth is corruption, something that Lourenço took a hard line on during his electoral campaign.

In one of his boldest policy moves to date, the president has told Angolans they risk prosecution if they do not repatriate funds illegally held abroad within the coming months. Speaking at the end of a conference on corruption held by  his party, the ruling MPLA, he said a grace period would be announced during which money could be repatriated and invested in the Angolan economy with no questions asked – a thinly veiled warning to those who have plundered the country’s assets.

These reforms suggest a new economic path for Angola. It remains to be seen whether Lourenço can gather enough support from his party to properly implement them, or indeed if they are indicative of a long-term strategy rather than minor calibrations.

“If he tried to shake up the system too much he would lose his support base. I imagine it would be extremely difficult to totally abandon a system that has been steeped in corruption and patrimonialism, so I think there is a real concern that the initial symbolic move might eventually be replaced by another entrenched system,” says Gastrow.

Can oil save Angola?

After the dismissal of Isabel dos Santos, Angolans are looking to the state oil company, Sonangol, under its new head, Carlos Saturnino, to save the country from its economic woes. The World Bank estimates that public debt stood at 59.2% of GDP at the end of 2016. Net international reserves have deceased by 20.4% since the beginning of 2017.

Inflation now stands at around 27%. As oil accounts for a third of economic output in Angola and over 95% of exports it is clear the sector needs a revamp, irrespective of rising oil prices. According to the major oil companies, the Angolan oil sector is being devastated by delays in project approvals at Sonangol and a backlog of payments owed.

Roque cites the planned Lobito refinery as one such project – construction has been delayed for years due to irregularities in contracts and financing disagreements. The refinery would work wonders for downstream production in Angola, and it is yet to be seen how Saturnino will tackle the issue.

Sonangol owes huge sums to its biggest lenders – the Bank of China, Standard Bank and Standard Chartered – as well as $3bn to majors, contractors and traders. The government itself lent Sonangol $6.9bn in 2016, a sum procured from the China Development Bank.

That said, Lourenço remains optimistic about the company’s potential and described it as a “golden goose”, instructing the new board to “take good care of her.” His recent pragmatism suggests progress for the sector.

Roque points out that under Eduardo dos Santos, the French major Total was partially excluded from the local market due to strains with the French government. Total and Sonangol have now signed new project pipeline agreements to develop upstream and downstream projects, and this move seems to indicate Lourenço’s growing wish to open all areas of Angola to new players and investments.

“He is trying to signal there is an alternative,” says Gastrow. Whether or not any of these recent developments will come to define Lourenço’s administration will depend on how genuine the reforms are and how much his party allows. For now, the signs are good.

Source: Tom Collins, African Business Magazine

Confidence has been returning to Kenyan markets, with foreign investors taking the lead since the inauguration of Uhuru Kenyatta as president for a disputed second five-year term in November.

Although President Kenyatta won the October election rerun, which had been mandated by the Supreme Court, almost half of the voting public did not show up for the poll on the instructions of his rival, Raila Odinga, who boycotted the second poll. President Kenyatta had won the election held in August, but it was deemed to have been conducted improperly by the Supreme Court.

President Kenyatta may be forced to spend his second term in office trying to win over those who obeyed the other man. Probably in light of this, after his inauguration he quickly signed into law the County Allocation of Revenue Amendment Bill, which empowered the Treasury to disburse funds to the country’s 47 counties. Delay in release of the funds had been hampering the work of the devolved administrations in the counties.

But there are other problems he will have to contend with. Odinga plans to swear himself in as an alternative president. A planned oath-taking in December was shelved after pressure from local and international stakeholders. Such actions by the opposition are a headache President Kenyatta may have to contend with for his entire second term and almost certainly for all of 2018.

Renewed threat of secession

Unfortunately, President Kenyatta has ruled out dialogue with the opposition. He could come around on this, but the opposition may not be similarly obliging. The renewed threat of seccession in the coastal areas, which are also strongholds of the opposition, is another thorn in the president’s side. President Kenyatta will have a hard task changing sentiment in this regard.

Set for take-off

The economy should move faster in 2018 after slowing due to the impact of the prolonged election process on supply and demand and the effects of drought in the first half of the year.

Despite these troubles, Kenya managed to hold steady. And it maintained a stable exchange rate throughout the prolonged electioneering period, World Bank economist Allen Dennis remarked with admiration in December. This resilience is likely to keep investor sentiment positive in 2018.

Adewale Okunrinboye, FX specialist at Ecobank Transnational, believes growth in 2018 will be hinged on improvements in agricultural output (25% of GDP) as better rainfall drives a recovery from drought in the first half of 2017.

“Outside agriculture, growth prospects revolve around Kenya’s ability to unlock gains from improving transport links and construction of the SGR [standard gauge railway] extension”, he adds.

At a presentation in December, the governor of the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK), Patrick Njoroge, shed more light on this, asserting that Kenya’s SGR would not only hasten the transportation of freight offloaded from the ports to warehouses but also reduce costs by about 50%.

Ecobank believes that even though growth will probably accelerate in 2018, it is likely to be subdued and perhaps come out at about 5.2%. This could be improved if reforms on the growth-stifling interest rate caps are carried out. Financial sector GDP expanded at its slowest pace in six years in 2017 because of the caps.

And then there is oil. Production in the two blocks in Turkana County could start at about 2,000 barrels per day in 2018. Considering how little oil may be produced and the challenging logistics required to transport it by road and rail until a pipeline is constructed, its effect on economic growth is not likely to be significant.

Debt concerns

Monetary policy should be easier in 2018. “A high drought-induced base in the first half of 2017 implies that inflation is likely to decelerate strongly in the first half of 2018”, says Okunrinboye of Ecobank.

Consequently, the CBK will probably cut its benchmark interest rate from 10% at end-2017. However, there is a complication for the CBK in this regard. “Given the rate cap in place, such a move is likely to induce further bank demand for government securities, which has driven a compression in short-dated yields in 2017 despite the ‘tight’ monetary stance by the CBK,” says Okunrinboye.

This a scenario the CBK would be keen to avoid, so a rate move may be dependent on how much progress is made with the hoped-for legislative amendment of the interest rate cap law.

On the fiscal front, Kenya’s debt burden is concerning. It is expected to be almost 60% of GDP in 2017, with debt servicing expected to climb to about 35% of revenue, and likely higher in coming years, as the authorities plan to borrow even more. For instance, in late 2017, the authorities asked for bids for a proposed $2bn eurobond in early 2018.

With warnings coming from the World Bank, IMF, rating agencies and others, the authorities may do well to take heed.

Source: Rafiq Raji, African Business Magazine

Uganda is set to land two mega-million dealings in the course of the New Year that will arguably transform its economy. A crude oil refinery worth $500 million and oil export pipeline worth in the region of $200 million are the proposed projects for the sub-Saharan country that has already set its equity in making the project a success.

It is informed that the projects will cost the government a mammoth amount to be in the area of close to $7.5 billion.

The East African country is still I the search for an architectural designer, and as well an investor to inject the funds to ease the burden, which will as well set-up the phased 60,000 barrels daily refinery in a sought to be public-private partnership.

In return the African country will retain a 40% stake in the refinery, which is worth a cut for the state.

Two parties seem to be interested in the project and are believed to be on board already. There ongoing talks between the Intra-continental Asset Holdings venture that includes Yaatra Ventures LLC and General Electric (GE) Africa from America and Saipem SpA from Italy, and the DongSong venture from Asian country and powerhouse, China. The negotiations are to find a potential investor.

The refinery is a delicate project and the suitable investor would be needed to fulfill the passion of the government.

For the pipeline, the National Pipeline Company (NPC) is in check of the modalities. The subsidiary of the Uganda National Oil Company (Unoc) has been mandated to oversee and handle the government’s commercial interests as far as the petroleum sector is concerned.

The Energy and Finance Ministries have inspected the project and given a green light for it. The two projects have been approved avidly and will set to commence their construction in the near future.

Total E&P, the French company is monitoring the 1,445km pipeline which will have the capacity to feed neighbouring countries with oil.

The final investment decision on the pipeline is expected in the first quarter of 2018, while the engineering, procurement and construction contract will most likely be awarded in late 2018 or early 2019.

A modern maritime training facility has berthed in Liberia with a promise to address capital flight associated with overseas training of the manpower needs of the maritime industry.

The sate-of-the art training facility is situated in Marshall, lower Margibi County and boasts of modern training equipment that meets the requisite needs of maritime practitioners in line with the requirements of the global maritime watchdog, the International Maritime Organization (IMO).