TANZANIA: THE government has continued to improve the investment climate in the country by introducing an Electronic Investment Window which offers instant registration wherever an investor wants to set up business in the country.
The inauguration ceremony that was organised by the Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC) on Monday introduced a latest online registration tool dubbed Tanzania Electronic Investment Window (TeIW).
During the event graced by Prime Minister Kassim Majaliwa, the Investors Service Providers (ISPs) Guidelines and the National Investment Promotion Campaign were launched which will ease access to investment information.
Mr Majaliwa said the TeIW provides room for any investor to register a project on time as the digital system merges all key players, including the Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA), Business Registration and Licensing Agency (BRELA) and TIC to form one stop online registration that safeguard time lost in a fragmented system.
“As the electronic system today comes to operation, it is expected to address various challenges, including bureaucracy and conmen existing under the analogue system that led to loss of national revenue,” Mr Majaliwa said.
He said the launch of TeIW indicates tireless commitment by the sixth-phase government on creating an enabling investment atmosphere centred on system, legal and policies reforms.
Mr Majaliwa said the government will keep allocating enough funds for upgrading investment infrastructures in a bid to catalyse efficiency and transparency by putting visibility to all potential areas of investment.
He said the ISPs and the National Investment Promotion Campaign will shed light to both local and foreign investors, making the economy more vibrant with immense projects attraction as TIC eyes to reach its target of 10bn/- worth projects registration per year by 2030.
Earlier while concluding the Tanzania-China Investment and Business Symposium, the Premier said China is the leading investor in the country with registered projects worth 10bn/- US dollars.
He invited other investors all over the globe to come and invest in the country, noting that investment is crucial for job creation, foreign currency attraction and diversification of the economy.
Equally, Minister of State in the President’s Office- Planning and Investment, Professor Kitila Mkumbo said the country’s Investment Act of 2022 has facilitated allocation of 16 special investment areas to strategic investors, including Sapphire Floating Glass Manufacturing Factory launched recently at Mkuranga District, Coast Region.
Highlighting the merits of the electronic system, TIC’s Board Chairman Dr Bilinith Mahenge said the electronic system facilitates minute to minute presence of investment data that are useful for all investment stakeholders, especially on planning.
Dr Mahenge said TIC will reduce daily operations costs, including money that was spent on papers, adding that the new system will cut time spent by investors through the use of manual system which required them to fill about 54 different documents, a system that discouraged some investors.
For her part, Zanzibar Investment Promotion Authority’s (ZIPA) Director of Free Economic Zone, Ms Halima Wagao said ZIPA and TIC will excel together in providing quality services to investors, saying that on March this year Zanzibar also launched an electronic system.
He commended TIC for a notable achievement of utilising digital technologies to ease investment, saying such a move shares similar ambition with Zanzibar of positioning Tanzania as Africa’s investment hub.
Reacting on the launch of TeIW, an Economist, Dr Isaac Safari said the electronic system will rebrand Tanzania as the best investment destination after easing project registration or setting a business.
Dr Safari said intensive investment especially in the areas of manufacturing in the country will yield enough goods for local consumption and exports, thus strengthening the local currency and creating foreign currency to make the economy more stable.
Nevertheless, he urged the government to turn an eye on capacitating citizens with Information Communication Technologies (ICT) skills for them to catch up with the introduced electronic system.
