Tanzania FDIs balloon 50pc in three months

TANZANIA attracted investment worth 1.2 billion US dollars (2.8tri/-) in three months to March, thanks to President Samia Suluhu Hassan’s efforts in making the country the best investment destination in the continent.

The Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC) Monthly Investment Bulletin for March shows that from 93 projects in third quarter of the 2022/23 fiscal year, Tanzanians are expected to secure more than 16,400 job opportunities.

The third quarter investment was an increase of 48.9 per cent compared to 787.4 million US dollars encountered last year.

Additionally, it was 160 per cent increase when compared to 450.6 million US dollars of approved investments in the same period in 2021.

TIC Executive Director, Gilead Teri, said in the report that the two high-level engagements led by President Samia recently in discussing bilateral investment with the South African President, Cyril Ramaphosa and the US Vice-President, Kamala Harris visit to Tanzania late last month are some of the efforts geared at attracting more investments.

“Reforms are happening and the impact is reflecting on our monthly numbers,” Mr Teri said.

Other factors led to the ballooning of investments were the country return to international arbitration following changes in the Tanzania Arbitration Act (RE 2020).

“[This] marked another important step in the country’s reform journey aiming at cementing Tanzania’s place as a top investment destination on the continent,” the TIC head said.

Other indicators have remained solid. The transport and logistics index were strengthening with each mile of mega- infrastructure completion, cost of electricity at 8.45KwH US dollars (medium voltage) and 6.65KwH US dollars (high voltage) is the lowest compared to all regional peers – Eastern and Central Africa.

“Our talent pool is growing and our World Bank public sector digital transformation index is the highest in the region,” he said.

The report showed that the massive investments came from domestic sources, which contributed 887 million US dollars or 76 per cent of the total approved investments, while the foreign sources contributed 276 million US dollars or 24 per cent.

Moreover, a positive investment growth during the period under review was mainly driven by the robust performance of the construction and commercial buildings sector that soared by recording an impressive investment worth of 333. 2 million US dollars compared to 2.3 million US dollars in the third quarter of 2021/2022.

Moreover, the top five leading sources of FDI in March are China, USA, Mauritius, Spain and India.

Recently, the country enacted the new Tanzania Investment Act 2022, which among others provides options for dispute resolution in investment disputes which are:

To resolve the dispute in accordance with the arbitration laws of Tanzania, or in accordance with the rules of procedures for arbitration of the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) or within the framework of any bilateral or multilateral agreement on investment protection agreed to by the government and the government of the country where the investor originates.