bankelele

• Award Season Part Trois

  Posted: March 30, 2011, 6:48 pm by bankelele

  Following on part II
  
  The Anzisha Prize for young Africans (15-20 yrs) who have solved a problem /challenges in their community (via @kenyanpundit)
  
  The Android App competition. in the X.com dev. challenge participants can win prizes of up to $25,000. D/L is 14 May.
  
  The 2nd eLearning Africa Photo Competition runs through April 21.
  
  Facebook’s first hire in Africa - will be a growth manager in Nigeria (via @bellanaija)
  
  The 2011 Freedom to Create Prize main prize and imprisoned artist prize is open to 15 July (via @Kwani)
  
  Various jobs at Google East Africa .
  
  iHub Mentorship program. D/L is 6 April.
  
  Partial scholarships available to attend the 4th Global Forum on Innovation & Entrepreneurship. D/L is April 1
  
  Kenya Government Science & Technology scholarships (29) to study in China, for undergraduates and postgraduates in engineering, medicine, computer science, and pharmacy. D/L April 7.
  
  Connected Kenya Vision 2030 ICT awards from the Kenya ICT Board.
  
  Maisha Filmlab with free screenwriting directing camera sound and production workshops in East Africa. (via @mkaigwa)
  
  Mass Challenge a $1 million start up competition (via @egm_photo)
  
  Panos Eastern Africa media fellowships. D/ L April 6.
  
  Strathmore University’s Mobile Academy . D/L 31 March
  
  Winners of the Nokia Idea storm will have their ideas developed into phone apps. D/L is April 14.
  
  TEDGlobal 2011 takes place in Edinburgh, Scotland in July 2011. It moves from traditional Oxford this and 75 places available, and D/L is April 4.
  
  Africa Youth Trust Young Women Leaders funded by the UN Women Governance and Gender Programme. D/L April 15.
  
  Modern careers: Someone got hired via twitter
  
  Sports: The Watamu Triathlon takes place April 9 & 10 at the Kenya coast. D/L April 4.
  
  
  Photo is from a blog tracking a Cairo to Cape 12,000 kilometre bicycle expedition (equivalent to 4 Tour de Frances in 4 months). It’s now complete after a tough stint in Kenya.

• Motoring Moment: Thika Road, Commuter Trains

  Posted: March 22, 2011, 9:45 pm by bankelele

  Discovering Thika road: Took a road trip up Thika Road to hang with the Kuweni Serious crew last weekend. Chinese contractors are converting the road into a super highway and the dramatic transformation (follow Thika Road blog ) has plenty of soil hills, deep valleys, closed roads, missing roundabouts etc. It was a fun trip, but as it is said every day, don't drive on Thika Road if you're a stranger, or it’s dark, or the road is wet.
  
  The journey is made more dangerous by Matatu’s and some road regulars who make their way anywhere they see fit - by driving in the wrong land, making U-turns in traffic, over-lapping patient motorists etc.
  
  The highway defies belief, and when it’s done it will probably need other roads to be closed off or expanded. e.g Outer Ring Road and a bypass to Mombasa Road. The large volumes of traffic need to enter and exit cleanly and without delay otherwise there will be more situations like the one at Riverside Drive and (current) Museum Hill Roundabout where traffic waiting to enter these smaller roads spills over backwards onto the large highway causing more jams.
  
  The on-going rains make it more difficult and with all the un-drained water, some cars are probably washed daily only to end up covered in red mud. For users of public vehicles, the rains mean added journey times and increased fares on Matauts.
  
  More Commuter Trains: However there is some relief for commuters who live along Thika Road since Rift Valley Railways (RVR) has upped the number of daily consumer trains in Nairobi from 8 to 18 which collectively serve Kahawa, Dandora, Embakasi, Ruiru, Kikuyu, and Kitengela/Athi River
  
  The addition of the early morning trains has slashed some commuters’ fares by almost 2/3 e.g. some Embakasi residents who take the train paying Kshs 30/- per trip compared to the previous Kshs 70 – 100 per trip by Matatu. Also, the train is more dependable, and takes 25 minutes to complete the journey, unlike driving in a car or matatu, which usually takes over an hour in 'rush hour'.
  
  Ultimately having dependable train travel may lessen the burden on the roads (fewer Vitz card) and while there is talk of having a train to Jomo Kenyatta Airport, it is not a government priority or feasible in the short to medium term.
  
  Commuter trains aside, the reason that the concessionaire, Egypt’s Citadel (operating as Kenya Uganda Railway Holdings) invested was for cargo and the train transport while significantly cheaper than the Kshs 120,000 ($1,500) to transport a container by lorry from Mombasa to Nairobi ($3,600 for Mombasa to Kampala) needs to emphasize this aspect and demonstrate more reliability to business owners. This will relieve the burden on the roads.
  
  Oil Shipment: As the international price of oil is expected to go up owing to instability in the Middle East, in Kenya there is a small dispute between oil companies led by Shell and Kenol pitted against NOCK - National Oil Corporation (NOCK), a Kenya government state agency that imported the latest shipment of diesel on behalf of all the oil companies. After some postponed arrival delays, and tales of missing phantom ships [MT Volga, MT Adden, MT Ratna Sheruti, MT Ratan Namrata], which resulted in a partial cancelation by Shell, a shipment finally arrived on March 1.
  
  However that did not put the matter to rest since NOCK has announced that they would bill the oil companies using the higher March prices instead of the February price. And where is the diesel? NOCK says it has all been sold, but the other oil companies say they have not bought it, and won't be buying it owing to the higher price being demanded.
  
  Fuel Relief: Some slight relief for motorists comes from Kenol who have discounted the price of petrol and diesel by 2 shillings on Tuesdays and Fridays – so petrol today costs about Kshs 100 (~$5.30/gallon) under Deal Poa promotion, and for holders of Kenol corporate fuel cards, they enjoy a 2 shilling discount every day, which doubles to Kshs 4 on Tuesday and Friday
  
  In Car Beverage: My current in-car beverage is Nestea iced tea that you can make in a supermarket. How? (i) Buy a Kshs 20 Nestea satchet (ii) Buy a one litre bottled water for Kshs 40 - 60 (any brand) (iii) pour the sachet contents in the bottle & shake (iv) you have a litre of iced tea for less than $1.

• Award Season Part Deux

  Posted: March 17, 2011, 2:51 am by bankelele

  This is a continuation of a series highlighting some open awards, that may be about to close in the next few weeks.
  
  The Acumen Fund East Africa Fellows Program aimed at entrepreneurs or people working on ground breaking programs with social impact in east Africa and will receive training in leadership , and is modeled around an executive MBA. D/L is 15 April for launch in July 2011
  
  The Africagrowth Institute 2011 SMME Awards that recognizes \small, medium or micro enterprise (SMME)companies that are growing sustainably and contributing to economic growth. D/L is 30 June
  
  (For Women): The Anita Borg Agent Award for ladies who demonstrate use of technology to change lives. Sponsored by Google, it has prizes of $5,000 in travel reimbursement to attend the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. D/L is May 2
  
  (For Women): The annual Business Daily Top 40 Women Under 40 award series in Kenya that recognizes women achievers in the world of business. D/L is 10 April.
  
  The Diageo Africa Business Reporting Awards that recognize outstanding journalists, editors, blogs, and other media that feature coverage of the African businesses scene. D/L is 27 March.
  
  (For Writers): The Golden Baobab Prize for Literature is a Pan-African literary award. Details here.
  
  The Nestle Prize that recognizes projects in the fields of nutrition, clean water, or rural development that create shared value. D/L is 30 June.
  
  The Shuttleworth Foundation for people ready to commit to undertake social change through innovation. They review applications in May 2011 for September intake.
  
  (For Journalists): The United Nations journalism fellows program Dag Hammarskjöld Scholarship Fund program aimed at developing country journalists with an interest in international affairs and winners get to travel to and report on the United Nations from New York. D/L is 6 April.
  
  (For Writers): The World Bank Essay competition open to people aged 18 – 25 to write about youth migration. Details here but the deadline is tomorrow – 17 March.
  
  EDIT: PIVOT 25 competition for developers in June 2011 with prize money of up to $75,000. Deadline is April 15.
  
  The Nairobi Stock Exchange young investors challenge whose registration period is on-going through April.
  
  Any other awards that can be highlighted here?

• Cheque Truncation

  Posted: March 16, 2011, 2:42 am by bankelele

  There’s an ongoing exercise within the Kenyan banking fraternity (KBA) to standardize cheques issued in the country under a process known as cheque truncation – and this will enable transfer of electronic images of customer cheques replacing the current process of physical of exchange of cheques by different banks at a central clearing house
  
  Odd and large size cheque will be withdrawn between March and May 2011 and replaced by standard size cheques that are 7” by 4” inches in size and with enhanced security features by June 1.
  
  The new system may halve the time spent in cheque clearing, which is currently about four (4) working days for most people. This has made cheques uniquely unpopular for small people, not just because of the cost of operating a bank account, but because of the cumbersome week-long time delay in the age of instant money transfers such as M-pesa.
  
  Why are cheques good? They are easy to use, offer verifiable proof, security, and credit. While some buyers wants to stretch payment, and sellers wants immediate payment, both buyers and sellers have been tripped up by the four day cheque clearing cycle, sometimes to the benefit of bank - and a reduction in the cheque cycle could mean more income for them. Of Equity Bank's income in 2010, Kshs 1.1 billion ($14 million) was from temporary overdrafts/un-cleared effects – which means you wrote a cheque, didn’t have cash in account, but Equity cleared (did not bounce) the cheque and charged a fee for the service.

• Going Postal

  Posted: March 16, 2011, 2:35 am by bankelele

  in a nice way
  
  Spent a couple of days at the post office trying to trace a large parcel for the Kuweni Serious program.
  
  It took several trips to the post office over about two weeks, e-mails to the sender, checking with the US postal service tracking system, and finally after a third visit to the local post office tracking department it was eventually traced in a cage where it had sat for almost a month.
  
  The parcel had been addressed properly with name and physical address of the recipient, but the American sender had not written the Kenyan post office box number - and this omission triggered this long process to locate the package at Posta
  
  Once it was found and tagged, with a (newly printed)ticket stub this paper, the carton and a sample item removed from the carton after it was opened for inspection, were probably handled by about a dozen employees, in the space of a few feet who all inspected & counted the goods, assessed them for taxation, and then signed off on the movement from one station to the next.
  
  It also entailed another trip to a bank down an adjacent street to pay taxes which are arbitrarily calculated - based on the invoice (if enclosed), shipping slip or the estimated insurance value declared on the package by the shipper.
  
  Still the staff were helpful courteous and honest. They are largely older people working in a system that does not seem to appreciate initiative. In another company, there would be a way to knock off lost or suspense items - and if a carton sat in a wrong office for a month, with a physical address on it, someone would use Google, and make a call to try and alert the proper recipient. And the office could probably run with a quarter of the staff
  
  Still the post office has so much potential to move packages from overseas, around the country etc. With computers you can only exchange words, images, sound, picture’s but to get actual goods & equipment, you need physical shipments. The 500 post offices around the country handle about 200,000 parcel items a quarter and moved 31.7 million letters in 2009 (via CCK stats ) - and while there are competitors like DHL, UPS and local variants are faster, but much more expensive.
  
  In short, the Post Office works when it’s open (the international parcels department is closed for lunch at 12:30 to 2 PM) and if your packages are properly addressed in a way they understand. But if you have a mule (not the drug kind, but known passenger able to fly with your goods) have them carry it for you, and pay the extra baggage cost, especially if its a valuable or fragile item.

• Urban Inflation Index: March 2011

  Posted: March 10, 2011, 4:05 pm by bankelele

  Comparing changes in the three months ago since December 2010 and just for memories sake, inflation last year and two years ago in March 2009.
  
  2011 has been an interesting year, with Middle East & north Africa instability, rain shortfall expected, noisy politicking in the country, but still banks have been posting record profits, IPO's are over-subscribed, and companies continue with regional expansion plans to conquer Eastern and Central Africa.
  
  changes in the last three months
  
  Gotten cheaper
  
  Communications: While the cost of calling has stabilized at ~Kshs 3 ($0.036 per minute) it remains to be seen if this is sustainable for all the mobile companies in the long run. Quality is suffering with issues like erratic internet service, busy lies, undelivered SMS, m-pesa downtime etc.
  
  Airtel continues to outsource, Yu chugs along with low price and no flash, Orange launch new unique products (iko pesa with Equity bank) but does not push it through with coherent marketing muscle, as does Airtel. Market leader Safaricom has lost a little market share, and has the additional weight of being the only listed mobile operator with few happy shareholders and friend & foe are either studying or chipping away at its M-pesa whose spectacular success has not been replicated by the company (Vodafone) or in any other country.
  
  SMS costs have come down from Kshs 3 to Kshs 1 finally, and the area of interest is mobile data in urban area where mobiles are taking up ground that few ISP’s have been able to cover. For comparison, for Kshs 250 ($3) you get 80MB on Safaricom, 200MB on Orange and 300MB on Airtel.
  
  Unchanged
  
  Utilities: At Kshs 1,750 ($21), last month’s electricity bill from KPLC is almost the same as 1,800 three months ago, and two years ago, respectively, while it was 1700 in March 2010. This is however expected to go up later this year, with rain shortfalls projected and the country mainly dependent on hydro electric power generation.
  
  Other food item: 2 Kg Mumias Sugar is Kshs 195, unchanged over the last year, but which was at 165 two years ago. However bread and milk are up in urban areas.
  
  More Expensive
  
  Staple Food: Maize flour which is used to make Ugali that is eaten by a majority of Kenyans daily. A 2 kg. Unga pack at Uchumi today costs Kshs. 80 - and while this is 23% higher than Kshs 65 three months ago, many have forgotten that a year ago it was 84 and two years ago Unga cost 96 shillings!
  
  Fuel: A litre of petrol is currently Kshs 98.8 [~$5.40] (up 15%) compared to 84.9 last March and two years ago it was Kshs 75 shillings per liter. It's been three months now since price control regime was introduced and petrol has crept up from 94 to 95.8 and now 98, with a return to the above 100 mark expected in the next review, but by which time the formula may be discarded. Meanwhile, Kenol and the Energy Ministry have toned down their war of words, but National Oil Corporation of Kenya cannot escape the news with questions of its capacity to undertake increased petrol responsibilities that the Government keeps allocating to them.
  
  Foreign Exchange: The US dollar trading at Kshs 83.0, and news reports that this is a 17 year low for the Kenya shilling (CBK site goes back about seven years and show a range of 61 to 83). This compares to December when it was Kshs 80.5 and a year ago at 76.6, but two years ago it was at Kshs 80.07.
  
  
  Entertainment: Tusker beer is Kshs 170 ($2) at the local pub - up from last year's 150. The Mutuho Law is likely to blame for putting a damper on bar profitability, by setting drinking hours from 5 to 11 PM on weekdays and (starting at 2PM on weekends) and there are creative ways around this as observed by more sales of alcohol at supermarkets who can sell it from 10AM
  
  Rent: Is up 25% from this year, after the last increase which was two years ago of 40%, however the landlord has not made any investment in the property or changed the service to justify these, but has probably done that elsewhere.

• Real Estate Moment

  Posted: March 4, 2011, 3:27 pm by bankelele

  Homes Expo: There was also another real estate expo at Sarit Centre last week - and some of the price ranges observed included
  
  - Two bedroom apartments in kahawa are Kshs 5 - 6M
  - 3 bedroom in kileleshwa/kilimani Kshs 16 - 17M ($200,000)
  - 3 br Athi River are Kshs 5 – 7 million ($70,000 - $90,000)
  
  Other property prices of interest seen there, and also away from the expo include
  - Tatu City and other ongoing developments like Migaa and Thika Greens which are modern estate communities that encompass shopping malls, schools, community centres, club house, sporting facilities/golf course, medical centres etc.
  - From Regent - twelve (12) units of 2-br flats in Umoja for Kshs 16 million ($200,000)
  - New office space in the Nairobi area ranges from Kshs 10,000 to 15,000 per square foot - and at Morningside it's 12,000 per sq foot ($150/sq.ft)
  - In the newspapers was a 9-storey building for sale, which is located in the central business district of Nairobi with 99 year lease, is fully leased, and brings in annual income of Kshs 20 million ($250,000)
  - From Kenya Valuers are some of the priciest real estate prices seen including; an acre of land in Kilimani for sale at Kshs 180M ($2.25 million) and another at Kshs 225M ($2.8 million), a 4=br house in Muthaiga for Kshs 150M, a 6-Br in Windsor for Kshs 180M, and a 5-br in Runda that rents for $7k/month.
  
  Mortgage report: Was released by the World bank and Kenya's Central Bank - and it showed that KCB and Housing Finance are the leading banks in the sector with about 4,000 mortgages worth Kshs. 17 billion ($212 million) each . Barclays have 742, CBA 238, Prime 651 and First Community with 157 – which presumably offers only sharia complaint products. Mortgages rates average at 14% up from 12.5% in 2006 - and there were 6,000 new mortgages in 2009 up from 1200 in 2006.
  
  Developers Club: KCB Kenya’s largest bank and leading mortgage company has a developers club for local developers and held a session this week in Nairobi.
  
  Some Highlights
  - Mumo Musuva, an architect with Planning Systems talked about this being a very exciting time for Nairobi, currently ranked No. 102 in the large cities of the world with a population of 4 million and which is projected to become No. 73 with a population of 8 million - and with 60% of the country population below the age of 30.
  - He’s also lead developer with Tatu City and they are going to use digital management & GIS, detect when someone leaves a tap open, cut off the utilities of tenant who don’t pay, collect rates and deploy that to infrastructure etc.
  - He lamented the low quality of most real estate buildings & projects in Nairobi as developers have been chasing quick returns (ROI) – these will change to world standards including environmental designs as the requirements of working with large tenants are evolving.
  - The definition of real estate is changing from owing a house or building to it being seen as a commodity - and this is evidenced with the current investment for speculative purposes and eventual roll-out of REIT’s.
  - There are massive opportunities for developers in Rwanda, Uganda, south Sudan which KCB can finance.
  - They also launched a new KCB property guide will feature developers. The bank also expanded its mortgage offerings (available at their 168 branches), to loans for Kenyans in the Diaspora at 7% in foreign currency as well plot & purchase construction loan - unlike with previous arrangement where one had to pay off a plot loan before commencing construction
  - The developers forum which has 300 arranges fact finding trips abroad to China, and possibly South Africa, & Brazil - and Joe Mungai of Tamarind Properties advised any developers to take such trips before embarking on any large projects to learn concepts like construction for low end housing, waste treatment & gated communities.
  
  REIT’s: The Capital Market's Authority (CMA) is undertaking a review of the Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT regulations ) & rules that formulated they in 2009. They will get feedback from developers and real estate institutions on product demand, tax rules. D/L is March 25 2011

Blah blah blah

Fish cakes

Alas a fish cake.

Yet more fish cakes

Guess what ... yeah ... fish cakes.

The end of the fish cakes