THE MREMA PHENOMENON

The main feature in Bulletin No 39 concerned what was described as the ‘Mrema Phenomenon’ and explained the energetic activities of the Minister for Home Affairs, Mr Augustine Mrema, in fighting corruption and crime. There has been no let up in his fight during the last four months.

He has:
– launched a thorough investigation of 16 Customs and Sales Tax officers allegedly involved in a tax fraud syndicate amounting to TShs 215.1 million; they were alleged to have colluded with a Zambia-based company to defraud the country of revenue on 262 vehicles purported to be in transit but actually sold in Tanzania;
– already spent TShs 13.8 million on rewards (at the rate of 10% of the funds recovered) to persons providing information about crimes that have been committed, consequently saving over TShs 1 billion of government funds; amongst criminals exposed had been 381 using ‘police money’ and 2,804 ‘gongo’ distillers; some 494 elephant tusks had been intercepted;
– learnt to his surprise that one person had been selling roasted human meat to hard-working gem miners some of whom believed that by eating this meat they would be able to find more gems;
– given the management of the Tanzania Fisheries Corporation (TAFICO) one month to explain a TShs 20.1 million loss and certain unaccounted imprests;
– instructed that any vehicle impounded in connection with illegal gold deals would be confiscated by the government;
– given the Soviet airline Aeroflot two weeks to submit sales records for the last five years to help probe allegations that it might have drawn US$1.0 million from the country’s foreign exchange reserves through selling tickets illegally in local currency;
– directed Printpak Tanzania Limited and the Tanzania Posts and Telecommunications Corporation (TPTC) to explain a suspected multi-million shilling scandal associated with a printing order;
– demanded the immediate payment by seven export companies of US$ 1.7 million for products exported during the last three years;

The real bombshell, however, came on June 8th 1991 when six people were rounded up at Dar es Salaam airport carrying TShs 136,624,009 in cash and travellers cheques and 11 ounces of gold worth TShs 36 million. Mr Mrema told newsmen that the businessmen who had been carrying the foreign exchange to Dubai had been allowed to go free because they were mere agents of ‘bigshots’ who were masterminding the racket. Some of the funds were sealed in African Pride tea packets. On July 5th it was reported that the entire haul (except the gold) had been returned to its owners in Zanzibar.

Zanzibar Chief Minister Dr Omar Ali Juma told cheering businessmen at a meeting in early July that he wished to thank the Union Government for returning the money and added that “the People on both sides of the United Republic demand that the ‘big shots’ be named. Many others have been expressing similar views. ‘Africa Events’ later reported that a UN Volunteer had had his US$ 2,000 worth of travellers cheques nabbed and was awaiting prosecution and an FAO expert had had to leave the country after a US$ 1,000 transaction. Minister Mrema warned foreigners working in Tanzania ‘not to involve themselves in illegal transactions’ – Daily News.

FAILURE TO USE LOCAL CONSULTANTS

The failure to use local consultants was a ‘Betrayal’ according to Robert Rweyemamu writing in the January 18th issue of Dar es Salaam’s Business Times. The article began by stating that behind every successful project there is always a successful consultant. ‘Yes, consultants are a brand of businessmen who seem to be indispensable in every walk of life’. ‘Occupying a place of dominance in the field of consultancy in Tanzania is the Tanzania Industrial Studies and Consultancy Organisation, otherwise known as TISCO. It was established under Act No 2 of 1976. It is an interesting piece of legislation. On the one hand it gives TISCO’ s big wigs the power to monitor and vet employment of local and foreign consultants in the country ….. On the other hand dear TISCO does not seem to have been vested with enough professional clout or technical vim and vigour to be able to limit the influx of foreign consultants into the country or to keep the clamour for foreign consultancy under control …. the original legislation .. . created TISCO mainly to slash our overdependence on foreign expertise in the running of our (wobbling) economy …. Yet our ‘banana republic’ coughs out nearly 300 million yankee dollars a year paying for consultancy services … a good chunk of our export earnings’.

The Managing Director of M/S Iramba Management and Industrial Services Ltd. Dar es Salaam, Hr Lawrence Mmasi, recently made scathing attack on government leaders’ neglect and/or failure to give sufficient support to the local consultancy industry. “It is a betrayal of the taxpayer’s interests to throw overboard local people trained at such a high cost” he said. “Consultancy has not been seen as an important productive or service sector. On the part of donors there is no serious goodwill to support local consultancy”.

SISAL – THE ‘WHITE GOLD’ OF TANZANIA – RECENT DEVELOPMENTS

Sisal production by Tanzania has dropped significantly since the 1960’s and has stabilised over the last five years at approximately 30,000 tonnes of line fibre per annum. In 1989 approximately one third came from public sector estates of the Tanzania Sisal Authority (TSA) and the remaining two thirds from privately owned estates. Recently, obvious signs of a move towards increased demand have encouraged new investment in the industry and, with it, technical changes.

TECHNICAL CHANGES
Sisal has been processed traditionally by large stationery decorticators with effluent being removed by water pumped to the factories to wash the fibre. Transport costs for the collection of leaf have always been high in relation to the amount of sisal fibre extracted (about 4% dry fibre/leaf) and, in consequence, any way of reducing transport costs has been of interest to growers. During the 1970’s experimental work was carried out to develop a ‘mobile decorticator’ capable of radically reducing transport costs. Early machines were initially developed and constructed in Kenya by Mr Evan Spyropoulos. They met with a mixed and guarded reception mainly because of doubts about their reliability, their productivity and the quality of the fibre produced.

In the mid-eighties Spyropoulos entered into a partnership with Michael Dobell, a UK based entrepreneur, and, eventually, production moved from Mombasa to Chard in Somerset and the machine received a brand name – the ‘Crane’ mobile decorticator. The machine now offers sisal growers in Tanzania and elsewhere a cost effective alternative to the hauling of thousands of tonnes of leaf to machines designed, and often built, before the Second World War. The TSA has already invested in a number of the units which are driven by a 100-120 bhp tractor. They are operating with some success in the Central Line production area around Morogoro. Other sisal growers in Kenya and Tanzania are becoming increasingly interested in seeing how effective they will prove to be in the long term.

An alternative invention developed by Ralli Estates, a joint venture between the TSA and the UK’s ‘Chillington Corporation’, has been the utilisation of weight transfer hitches and large trailer units for leaf transport to traditional decorticator units. These have replaced the 6-7 tonne capacity lorry units on estates where no railway systems exist so that 95 bhp tractors can now be seen successfully hauling loads of 15-18 tonnes with little difficulty. Ralli Estates has also undertaken significant modifications to ‘Stork 20-12′ 8nd ’20-10’ decorticator units which they hope can significantly increase production efficiencies.

NEW INVESTMENTS FROM NON-TRADITIONAL SOURCES
The recent improvement in the price of sisal, as the green movement encourages greater use of organic hard fibres, has brought about a significant change in mood in the Tanzanian industry, aided by a number of devaluations of the Tanzania Shilling and a liberalisation of marketing regulations for sisal. The result has been increasing new investment in the industry from non-traditiona1 sources. Examples include the purchase of a number of estates by Tan Farms owned by the Chavda Group, the Ralli Estates investment by Chillington Corporation and the recently started Ngomezi project on TSA estates near Korogwe, funded by the German Government and managed by the British firm Booker Tate.

On the processing front the TSA has negotiated funding from Italy to rehabilitate machinery at their Ngomeni factory and hopes to see the Mruazi factory between Muheza and Korogwe reopened in due course.

All the spinners are short of fibre in all grades and there is an expectant atmosphere pervading the industry with hopes that production can rise to meet the demand that already exists. Processing capacity, once the Ngomeni factory has been refurbished, will total more than double the existing total production of fibre nation wide. Providing the market remains strong there seems little doubt that local processors will be keen to add value to all available production.

The prospects for sisal therefore look much better than they did a decade ago and one would hope that growers fibre could soon resume its place as the ‘White Gold’ of Tanzania.
Steve Vaux

Mr S.G.M. VAUX is an agriculturalist with Booker Tate. He is working as a Project Controller whose main responsibility is co-ordination of the five and a half year Ngombezl Sisal Estate Project near Korogwe.

TANZANIA’S NEW INVESTMENT CODE

In the June session of Parliament a Bill was enacted under the title: National Investment (Promotion and Protection) Act 1990. The purpose was to stimulate local and foreign investment by setting up an Investment Promotion Centre and establishing the rules governing investment in Tanzanian enterprises, particularly of foreign capital. The Act applies throughout industry, except petroleum and minerals, to which existing legislation applies. While it replaces the Foreign Investments (Protection) Act 1963 it incorporates, with necessary amendments, a number of other statutes, including the Companies (Regulation of Dividends and Surpluses and Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1972. (Footnote – A useful account of the state regulation of foreign investment between 1961 and 1985 is given in an article by S. Rugumamu in Africa Development, VOL XIII, No 4, 1988. The new Act aims at avoiding the gross economic errors and mismanagement that have blemished so many parastatal enterprises financed from abroad by means of a monitoring mechanism with statutory powers of control. The Act is based on a coherent policy with regard to overseas investment, the 8srlier absence of which forms a central theme in Mr. Rugumamu’s article.)

The underlying purpose of the legislation is twofold. First, it establishes machinery for the stimulation of investment in Tanzanian industry and offers tax incentives for investment in new enterprises and the expansion or rehabilitation of existing enterprises. Secondly, it lays down rules to ensure that new investment, particularly from overseas, does not lead to abuses and is directed towards enterprises of greatest importance to the Tanzanian economy without creating new burdens only capable of satisfaction in foreign exchange.

The first of these objectives arises from a recognition that an attempt must be made to attract foreign capital if the pace of economic development is to be maintained. Despite attempts to stimulate domestic saving by a new government bond issue and maintaining interest rates at levels comparable with the rate of inflation, local resources alone will be inadequate to sustain economic development at more than a very slow pace. The appointment of Mr George Kahama as Director General of the new Investment Promotion Centre is intended to make use of his earlier experience as General Manager of the National Development Corporation, a holding company for the financing of Tanzania’s growing industrial base in the sixties and seventies, The establishment of the Centre will attract the approval of the World Bank and bilateral aid donors.

Tanzania has, however, learned the hard way how counter productive foreign investment can be. First, there is the danger of transnational corporations, having invested in Tanzania, exporting products at artificially low prices in order to gain a cost benefit elsewhere, a practice that would have the effect of forcing Tanzania to subsidise a foreign firm. Secondly, externally funded projects may be so designed as to rely heavily on imported raw materials and equipment, resulting in a net outflow of scarce foreign exchange. Thirdly, the technology chosen may be quite inappropriate to Tanzanian conditions and both expensive and difficult to maintain. There are examples of all these shortcomings in the earlier history of industrialisation in Tanzania. It was therefore essential to impose on the Director General a duty to satisfy himself that a proposal will a) maximise foreign exchange earnings and savings, b) enhance import substitution, c) expand food production, d) increase employment opportunities and enhance human resource development , e) conduce to the efficient use of productive capacity of existing enterprises and f) improve linkages between different sections of the economy. The Director General will also have to consider other matters such as the source of raw materials, employment conditions, siting, the financing plan and ‘the need to generate constructive competition among enterprises’.

These enquiries may seem onerous and could lead to bureaucratic delays. To minimise this risk the Act requires Ministries, to which aspects of a proposal are referred, to reply within 14 days and enjoins on the Centre to give its final decision within 60 days. It remains to be seen whether such time limits will be reasonable in practice or will lead to slipshod decisions. A great deal depends on the willingness of the promoters to provide reliable information without delay which they are bound under the Act to submit. If an affirmative conclusion is reached a Certificate of Approval is issued. The Certificate may be amended or transferred with the approval of the Centre. Where its terms are not adhered to, or in the event of fraud, a Certificate may be cancelled in which case the Centre may withdraw any rights and benefits and, if necessary, require the promoter to sell the enterprise.

INCENTIVES
As an incentive to investors The Act provides for a tax holiday of five years with respect to the taxation of profits and the witholding tax on dividends. Thereafter the normal rates of tax will apply to profits, namely, 50% for non-resident investors, 45% for residents and 22.5% for investors in cooperative societies; witholding tax on dividends – 10% for non- residents and 5% for residents.

Import duties and soles taxes on equipment, machinery, spare parts and materials to be used solely for the purposes of the enterprise are remitted. An enterprise may be allowed to retain in a foreign exchange account a proportion of its earnings abroad and up to 50% of such holdings may be used for the servicing of debts, the payment of dividends and the satisfaction of other external obligations. The apparent effect of this provision is to limit the proportion of foreign exchange earnings available for payments abroad to less than 50%, though the actual proportion is not defined.

RESTRICTIONS
The Act empowers the enterprise to pay dividends and profits to foreign investors in the approved foreign currency at the prevailing rate of exchange; to transfer abroad an approved proportion of the proceeds of sale of the enterprise; and to provide for the servicing or repayment of any foreign loan specified in the Certificate of Approval. Whether these provisions override the 50% limit referred to in the final sentence of the last paragraph could be a matter for legal debate. The payment of dividends is, however, limited by the terms of the Companies (Regulation of Dividends and Surpluses and Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1972 to the average of profits made in the last three years, or 80~ of the profits arising in the previous year, or such sum as will reduce the net worth of the enterprise as disclosed in the balance sheet to not less than 125% of the par value of the paid-up capital. The Minister has the power, subject to prior approval by the National Assembly, to authorise an enterprise to pay dividends at a higher rate, but this provision is unlikely to be used except in exceptional circumstances.

The trouble with these provisions is the extent to which they rely on permissive powers to be exercised by the Bank of Tanzania, or presumably by the Centre. In order to remove the anxieties of investors it may be necessary to spell out in regulations made under the Act the precise meaning to be attached to such phrases as ‘A portion of their foreign exchange earnings’ or ‘an approved proportion of the net proceeds of sale’. The word ‘approved’ also requires definition. As it stands the Act appears to favour projects involving only a limited foreign exchange commitment for operational purposes and to operate against entirely foreign-owned enterprises, which would be unable to recover in foreign currency more than a proportion of the proceeds of sale in the event of withdrawal. These may be justifiable acts of policy, but it may be necessary to delineate the borderline more clearly if foreign capital is to be attracted.

An approved enterprise cannot be compulsorily acquired except in the national interest and after due process of law, in which case, full, fair and prompt compensation must be paid in transferable currency.

The Act lists in a schedule three types of enterprise. Part A refers to areas of priority for private investment. Part B enumerates the areas reserved for public sector enterprises, except where the Minister grants a special license. In Part C appear those enterprises reserved for investment exclusively by Tanzanian nationals and those that are closed to foreigners investing less than $250.000. By far the most comprehensive list appears in Part A.

This legislation is essentially experimental. Many developing countries, not forgetting Eastern Europe, are competing for investment capital and it is not known whether investors will be attracted by the prospects offered by Tanzania. Decisions about investment also take into account circumstances other than those covered by legislation, such as the country’s political stability, the climate, the availability of staff housing and the personal taxation of expatriate staff. So, only the future will show whether these investment provisions will have the intended results.
J Roger Carter

PARLIAMENTARY MATTERS

The National Assembly’s 1990/91 Budget session began on June 5th in Dar es Salaam. The Assembly faced 885 questions from members and debates on all the different ministerial budgets. On its first day it voted to shorten the session by two weeks to give way to the Presidential and Parliamentary electoral process which was due to commence in August. The first stage, registration of voters began in August rather slowly and there were signs in some parts of the country of apathy.

In the Budget debates the Ministry which had the toughest time was the Ministry of Communications and Works. Debate took the House to the verge of dissolution as member after member put the government to task over transport problems in various parts of the country. Three MP’s threatened to block the estimates and one called for the resignation of the Minister, Dr Pius Ngw’andu. The Member for Sumbawanga withdrew a shilling from the Ministry’s vote demanding an explanation as to why the government had again shelved a plan to put tarmac on the road Tunduma-Sumbawanga-Mpanda. The Minister had explained that he proposed to improve the gravel on the road. At this stage, Prime Minister Joseph Warioba intervened and said that, under the regulations of the House it was too late to introduce a token vote whereupon several member’s said that the Parliamentary Regulations would have to be amended. After a weekend to cool off, the Member was asked by the Speaker whether he had now changed his mind. He replied “No”. At this stage the Attorney General was called in to explain the rules. The House decided to approve the Ministry’s estimates less one shilling in order to establish a token vote. The Prime Minister then explained that the House had rejected the Budget by its actions and that meant that the House had to be dissolved.

At this stage the Speaker set up a Party Committee which met behind closed doors. When the Members came together again in the evening it was stated that the Minister had agreed in writing to improve the road and the unhappy Member thereupon withdrew his objections.

During other debates, among the many suggestions made by Members were the following:

– Radio Tanzania should become independent;
– the ban indirectly imposed by Archaeologist Margaret Leakey on further research at the Olduvai gorge should be lifted;
– Ambassadors should be vetted before their appointment;
– there should be clarification on the criteria used by the government to determine coffee prices;
– prices of drugs at private pharmacies should be controlled;
– the government should cease to call for frugality;
– financial resources should be directed to help small farmers or they would disappear from the economic scene:
– delays in implementing Parliaments’ recommendations should cease.

Ministers announced that:

– installation of a television network for the mainland is expected to start in 1991;
– the government has increased prices for the main crops as follows:

Arabica coffee Shs 65.55 (old price Shs 55)
Robusta coffee Shs 60.50 (Shs 55)
SG cashewnuts Shs 110 (Shs 84)
UG cashewnuts Shs 73 (Shs 56)
Tea Shs 28 (Shs 17)
Pyrethrum Shs 120 (Shs 60)

BUSINESS & ECONOMY

THE BUDGET – AND THE DEBT PROBLEM
The main headline in the Daily News on June 8, 1990, which covered the 1990/91 Budget read ‘TAXES DOWN’. Taxation on salary income was reduced from between 10% and 50% to between 7.5% and 40% minimum taxable income moved up from Shs 1,900 to Shs 2,250 (the current exchange rate is about Shs 330 to £1); the minimum wage was raised by Shs 425 to Shs 2,500; the maximum salary for executives in the super scale category was raised to Shs 22,930 per month.

And so there was some reason for satisfaction amongst taxpayers. People had expected something worse.

But the new Minister- for Finance, Mr Stephen Kibona, made many other changes in his budget designed to create new sources of government revenue, ease tax collection and entice people to use bank accounts and save or invest in the economy. The Bulletin has space for only a summary of the many changes made.

The Minister began his speech with good news on the economic recovery programmes. The increase in production in key sectors of the economy which had been recorded since 1986 had been maintained in 1989 and consumer goods were still available throughout the country. The GDP had grown by 3.9% in 1987, 4.1% in 1988 and was projected to grow by 4.4% in 1989. This compared with an average GDP growth of 1.5% in the years preceding the economic recovery programme.

But, the Minister said, the objective of improving foreign exchange earnings had not made significant headway and the goal of providing drugs and medicines for hospitals and dispensaries, education and water for the people had been only partially achieved. Major problems existed in crop processing and transportation and in management in the cooperative unions and parastatals; there was a lack of accountability and a need to reduce red tape.

THE EXTENT OF TANZANIA’S DEBT
Mr Kibona went on to say that Tanzania had continued to experience serious problems in servicing external debt. Roger Carter has been looking into this problem in some detail and reports that, while Brazi1’s and Mexico’s debts are from private sources, over 931% of Tanzania’s foreign debts are of official origin ie: from governments or inter-governmental bodies. In 1988 Tanzania’s long-term debt amounted to US$ 4,091 million and by December 1989, according to the budget speech, had reached US$ 5,090 million. In 1988 earnings from exports and services were barely a third of the cost of imports and, of those earnings, near1y 18% was paid out for interest and repayments. In 1970 the debt burden had amounted to 20% of the GDP. But by 1988 it had reached 165% or the equivalent of the total wealth created over a period of almost 20 months.

The Minister stated that negotiations with creditor countries to reschedule or cancel debt obligations had proved very useful. Debt amounting to US$ 51 million had been cancelled and US$1,102 million had been rescheduled during the First Economic Recovery Programme (1986/89). During the Second Phase of Economic recovery (1989/92) some US$ 175 million had been cancelled and US$ 270 million was being rescheduled. As Roger Carter points out, Britain and the Scandinavian countries have been converting loans into grants for some years. Multilateral debts, which account for 35% of total long-term debt, consist mainly of World Bank loans incurred in the optimistic late sixties, they carry interest charges of around 8%; IDA (an affiliate of the World Bank) credits charge no interest and there 1s a grace period for repayments of ten years. A scheme has now been evolved for the use of IDA credits for the repayment of capital to the World Bank and in the financial years 1988/89 to 1990/91 about US$ 48 million of IDA money was made available. This met about 70% of the capital repayments due to the Bank during that period. Sweden and Norway have granted US$ 33 million since April 1989 towards the interest element in World Bank debt servicing.

Nevertheless, Tanzania’s debt burden seems likely to increase. Grace periods for IDA repayments will end and completion of earlier repayments for IDA credits still lies some years ahead. On the other hand, repayment of Bank loans will be completed in the next few years. On balance, the servicing of multilateral debts is expected to grow only slightly. Bilateral and private debt servicing however, is expected to increase by something like 35% between 1990 and 1993, yielding by 1993 a total obligation of some US$ 585 million, a figure in excess of Tanzania’s total current export earnings.

OTHER BUDGET HIGHLIGHTS
– to encourage the use of sources of energy other than firewood and charcoal, taxes on electric and kerosene cookers and solar heaters abolished;
– the obligation for visitors to change US$ 50 at airports abolished;
– road tolls abolished except at border posts; extra Shs 2.0 per litre on petrol and diesel;
– customs duty highest rate down from 100% to 60%;
– no change on beer, spirits, soft drinks, cigarettes, sugar;
– to encourage people to use banks, minimum taxable bank interest income raised from Shs 20,000 to Shs 250,000 per year;
– airport service charge for residents increased from Shs 500 to Shs 800; no change for visitors (US$ 20); vehicle registration up from Shs 2,000 to Shs 8,000;
– a new ‘instant’ lottery introduced.

INFLATION
The Minister of State (Planning), Prof Kighoma Malima, told the National Assembly on Budget Day that the rate of price increases for most consumer goods was slowing down. For most towns it was 23.8% in 1989. This meant that the inflation rate had slowed down by 4.5% compared with 1988 and was now the lowest since 1980. However, the rate was above the Economic Recovery target; it had been hoped that the rate of inflation would have been reduced to less than 10% by 1989.

CDC PLANS BIG INVESTMENTS
The Commonwealth Development Corporation (CDC) plans to invest in joint ventures in Tanzania in 1990 in such sectors as agriculture, forestry and tourism according to the CDC Representative in Dar es Salaan The Corporation intended to provide US$ 50 million to rehabilitate the Kagera sugar factory. £ 8.5 million to rehabilitate the coffee industry in the Kilimanjaro and Arusha regions and probably, depending on the result of studies underway, further funds would be made available for tea plantations in Njombe, the improvement of the Kilimanjaro Hotel, and in wildlife lodges in the northern tourist circuit – Daily News

BUSINESS & THE ECONOMY

INVESTMENT CODE READY
Tanzania’s new Investment Code drawn up by the government has finally been agreed after amendments insisted on by the CCM Party designed to stress the motivation of Tanzanians to invest in their own country.

At the beginning of April the Investment Code was brought before Parliament under a Bill entitled the National Investment Promotion and Protection Bill. In the debate there were demands for more definitive laws to protect local entrepreneurs from ‘the jaws of international capitalism’, clearer definition of customs policies and land ownership, guarantees on transfer of technology, a removal of red tape, more explanation of what joint ventures meant to Tanzanians and more progress in demarcating village boundaries ‘to protect them from the risk of losing their land to foreign investors’. The Minister for Industries and Trade, Mr Cleopa Msuya said that Tanzanians should change their attitude towards work, raise their productivity and assure foreign investors that they would get their money back. The Bill was subsequently passed unanimously – Daily News.

MORE BRITISH AID
Britain has announced an additional £2.5 million assistance to Tanzania’s Economic Recovery programme. The announcement was made by Mrs Lynda Chalker, Minister for Overseas Development during a dinner on March 5th 1990 hosted by Tanzania’s former Minister of Finance, Mr Cleopa Msuya. The sum is additional to the £15 million pledged by Britain during the consultative group meeting in Paris in December last year. The visiting Minister commended efforts being made by the Tanzanian Government towards economic recovery and pointed to the increase in agricultural and industrial output which had been achieved. The £2.5 million would be used for provision of human drugs and buses for urban transport and was in response to an urgent request from the government.

Mrs Chalker visited the Mnazi Mmoja Hospital, the Malawi dry cargo facilities at the Dar es Salaam port and the Kisimbani Clove research Station in Zanzibar.

PARLIAMENTARY MATTERS

There was a brief session of Parliament in April 1990 to deal, amongst other things, with the new Investment Code.

Mr Benjamin Mkapa, Foreign Minister announced that his 1989 foreign development projects had been completed. The High Commissioner’s House in London had been repaired (Shs 2 million), the Embassy building in Beijing had been purchased (Shs 66 million), and a house had been built for the Ambassador in Rome (Shs 40 million). Only half of the OAU’s members had contributed to the organisation’s regular budget for the period between 1975 and 1988. Tanzania had paid its dues.

The Deputy Minister for Home Affairs announced that the government planned to issue identity cards to all residents in Tanzania. Funds for the manufacture of the cards were now being sought.

The Deputy Minister for Defence and National Service revealed 1n answer to question that there were at present 67 Second World War veterans receiving pensions from Britain. The payments ranged from Shs 400 to Shs 4,400 per month depending on health status and disability. In 1962 some 5,000 soldiers had been receiving Shs 50 a year from Germany for service in the First World War but it was now difficult to obtain accurate records to support additional claims for compensation for war service.

A number of MP’s called for a total review of the Cooperative Law. “Peasants have no say over who to cooperate with” said the Member for Musoma Rural. Other members claimed that the government did not have a consistent policy on cooperatives and that it was directly interfering in the running of cooperative unions. The government was proposing the setting up of a new Apex organisation for the cooperative movement. The government also presented a Bill to Parliament to amend several provisions of laws that established crop marketing boards for cotton, coffee, tobacco and cashew nuts. The Boards will be turned into agents of cooperative unions.

The government also introduced an amendment to the Rent Restriction Act of 1984 to remove provisions that required landlords in commercial premises to look for alternative accommodation for tenants where the landlord wished to repossess his property for his own use.

In the March session of the Zanzibar House of Representatives the Member for Magomeni, Colonel Mussa Ameir, complained about the way in which the Isles’ legislature was represented at meetings of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association saying that, in most cases, the invitations were sent to the Union Parliament which was then at liberty to include or exclude Zanzibar representatives. “We demand direct invitation because the two legislatures have equal status’ he said.

Members of the House greeted with great joy a Bill which outlined their immunities, powers and privileges. The Bill allows for freedom of speech and debate in the House. This freedom would not be questioned in any court of law. No civil or criminal proceedings would be taken against any member for words spoken or written and Members would not be arrested for any civil debt except for a debt, the contraction of which, represented a criminal offence – Daily News

TANZANIA TO RECEIVE US$ 1.3 BILLION

A group representing 14 donor nations and 11 international organisations have indicated that they will provide US$1.3 billion to Tanzania to support the country’s economic adjustment and development programme in 1990.

The Consultative Group for Tanzania meeting at the World Bank’s Paris Office from December 18th to 20th 1989 said a large portion of the aid would be targeted at balance-of-payments support and the country’s social sectors.

The Group praised Tanzania’s progress in implementing its Economic Recovery Programme launched in 1986, noting that policy changes had helped raise agricultural productivity and increased the economic growth rate to about 4% per year.

At the meeting, the Government announced its plans to move ahead with the second phase of its Economic Recovery Programme. Endorsing the plan, the Group said it was pleased that the Government had incorporated a ‘priority social-action programme’ into the overall recovery programme.

The Group emphasised that further action is still needed in improving public-sector management and reforming parastatals. Attention should also be given to additional reforms in the agricultural marketing and cooperative systems and in the financial sector. The Group also supported a stronger role for the private sector in the economy.

The World Bank has published detailed tables indicating how different groups of countries have performed during the decade 1977 to 1988. Tanzania’s Gross National Income Per Capita was (in 1980 US dollars) $300 in 1977 but had fallen to $240 in 1988. Figures for Kenya were $440 in 1977 and $390 in 1988. Tanzania shares with Burkino Faso, Burundi Malawi, Mali, Ethiopia, and Somalia the lowest income amongst 40 Sub-Saharan countries whose estimated incomes are published in the latest World bank tables. Tanzania comes fifth from the bottom. By comparison the 1988 figure for the United States is $14,080 and for the countries of the European Community $11,640 – World Bank News.

BUSINESS & THE ECONOMY

SHOCK OVER COOPERATIVE DEBTS
Members of the National Executive Committee of the CCM Party have expressed shock over the huge debts cooperative unions owe the banks, the Committee’s Department of Mass Mobilisation and Political Propaganda said in a statement on October 12th 1989.

The Committee directed that the following cooperatives should, by January 1989 pay their debts or explain why they should not be deleted:
Nyanza Shs 5,250,000,000
Shinyanga Shs 3,440,000,000
Ruvuma Shs 1,570,000,000
Mara Shs 1,450,000,000
Mbeya Shs 1,340,000,000
Kagera Shs 1,270,000,000
Tabora Shs 1,200,000,000

The next day, during a short meeting of the National Assembly in Dodoma, the Member for Shinyanga Urban twisted a debate on a new Written Laws Bill by rejecting the amendment on the Cooperative Law and suggesting instead the suspension of its application and a change towards free marketing of crops. He said that the Cooperative Law, which provided for a monopoly to be given to cooperative unions, was a barrier to people seeking their own markets.

The member for Bariadi said that high interest charges on the unions were among the reasons for their poor performance. Shinyanga cooperative union was paying Shs two million in interest charges. A Nominated Member said that the marketing boards were a burden to cooperative unions and that they should be scrapped as they were useless – Daily News.

MWINYI OUTLINES INVESTMENT CODE
During a state visit to Japan in late December 1989 President Mwinyi gave the first indications of the shortly to be announced Investment Code for Tanzania. The President listed, at a meeting with Japanese economists, the eight areas of priority for investment. They were agriculture and livestock development, tourism, natural resources (forestry, fisheries, fish farming, game cropping and wildlife ranching), mining and petroleum development, (particularly oil and gas, gold, diamonds, gemstones), manufacturing industries (including agro-based industries, steel and metal engineering, printing and publishing, pharmaceuticals and electrical engineering ) construct ion (hotels, houses, warehouses), transport and transit trade.

On investment protect ion the President said that Tanzania will undertake to maintain a legal framework that will give guarantees of protection to foreign and domestic investors. Tanzania would join the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA).

On incentives he said that initial investments would be granted a tax holding on profits for the first five years of production. Constraints on foreign exchange remittance would be minimised. The President spoke at length about the importance of the private sector and appealed to the Japanese business community to invest in Tanzania – Daily News.

TANZANIA DEVALUES AGAIN
Tanzania devalued its Shilling again on December 4th 1989. This time the devaluation was by 17.1% to a new value of Shs 190 to the US dollar. The Bank of Tanzania said that the devaluation was meant to sustain recent gains in the agricultural and industrial sectors.

SWEDEN GETS TOUGH ON TAZARA
The Swedish Aid Agency (SIDA) has lashed out at ‘bad management and indiscipline’ in the Tanzania Zambia Railway (TAZARA) and threatened to pull out its multi-million dollar support unless the two states tackle the problems. In identical scathing letters to the Ministers of Communications in Tanzania and Zambia the Director General of SIDA said that it was not in the interests of Sweden nor the TAZARA owner countries to finance investments in the railway as this would merely replace resources being wasted due to bad management and indiscipline.

He noted that when the line was handed over to Tanzania and Zambia in 1976 there were 128 locomotives. Of these, only 39 were in operation in October 1989, another 39 were awaiting repair and 50 had been scrapped. Between July 1986 and August 1989 12 locomotives, 140 wagons and 26,500 sleepers had been damaged in 145 accidents costing roughly US$12 million. This excluded losses on salvage operations, opportunity losses and permanent loss of market share. The procurement of 350 new wagons by TAZARA with Swedish support would merely cover about seven years of wreckage of wagons at the present rate he said.

Sweden is in a US$ 4O million agreement to aid TAZARA. The total amount of aid being provided by all donors is US$ 150 million. Sweden had offered to help finance a thorough review of the TAZARA management system by an experienced consultant.

An official of the Finnish Development Authority said that though they had not yet evaluated a Finnish supported project involving the supply of rescue cranes and rerailing equipment, casual observation would show that there was a state of indiscipline and slackness within the authority’s management.

An official with the Norwegian Development Agency who spoke on condition of anonymity said there was a state of turbulence in TAZARA.

A USAID representative however stated that he did not see the problems that other donors had ‘capitlised on’ but that his agency would be ready to offer short course training in management. USAID is providing 17 locomotives and manpower training to TAZARA.

Speaking a month earlier TAZARA General Manager Standwell Mapara said that the railway, after several loss-making years, now seemed to be on the right lines. It would shortly be one of the most profitable lines in Africa. It had recorded losses of US$37 million in its first seven years but since 1984 it had begun to make meaningful profits. In 1986/87 it had earned a surplus of US$413,000.

The line was now carrying one million tons of freight – double the carrying capacity of 1986 and this would shortly increase to 1.6 million tons thanks to the modernisation programme being supported by eleven Western countries and international agencies – Business Times/Daily News.

CABINET RESHUFFLE
President Mwinyi reshuffled his cabinet in September 1989. He took over the Defence portfolio himself and moved five Ministers. This followed the departure of Mr Salim Ahmed Salim for his new post as Secretary General of the Organisation of African Unity. A full Ministry of Information was set up and the International and Regional Cooperation portfolio which was under the ministry of Foreign Affairs was shifted to the Ministry of Finance.

Shs 2 BILLION IN BRITISH AID
The British Government has agreed to give Tanzania £10.4 million (Shs 2.47 billion) in support of its Economic Recovery Programme. Some £4.5 million will also support English teaching. The programme will be expanded to cover 324 government and private secondary schools and will concentrate on a reading programme and in-service training for Tanzanian English language teachers.

Britain’s support for the University of Dar es Salaam will continue with the provision of 3508,920 to institute a MS Education programme in Applied Science at the Department of Zoology and marine Biology.

Tanzania’s Police force will receive £358,250 to assist in training programmes for criminal investigation and prevention.

The Songea-Makambako road built by Britain, will receive £1.57 million for extension of the existing maintenance project and the rehabilitation of the Lilondo quarry.

PARASTATALS RECEIVE ‘CLEAN’ REPORTS
More than half of the 396 parastatal accounts audited for the year ending June 30, 1989 received clean reports, The total of 51.5% is the highest proportion yet achieved. Another 35% of the account s were given qualified audit reports. 176 accounts disclosed profits and 189 recorded losses – Daily News.

SHERATON TO MANAGE KILIMANJARO HOTEL
According to the November 10th issue of Tanzania’s ‘Business Times’ Sheraton International will assume the management of the Kilimanjaro Hotel in 1990 under a partnership agreement with the Tanzania Tourist Corporation. Seven other hotels, including the Lake Manyara Lodge, Ngorongoro Lodge, Kunduchi Beach Hotel and the Mafia Lodge will also enter into joint management agreements with Accor, a French fir~ which Is already managing the Mount Meru Hotel. All the hotels are to undergo extensive repair and expansion at a cost of some US$35.0 million to be provided by a consortium including Swiss, German and Yugoslav firms plus the European Investment and African Development Banks.