Kenya and Germany will partner to set up more Technical and Vocational Education Training (TVET) centres across the country, according to President Uhuru Kenyatta who was speaking at State House. He was accompanied by German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who is in Kenya for a state visit, together with a delegation from Germany. President Kenyatta noted that Germany has offered to support programmes to improve youth employment and have offered to share experiences and resources to help transform the manufacturing and agriculture sectors, coupled with setting up TVET centres. “Under this initiative three centres of excellence have ben established, German will co-finance with Kenya phase one at a cost of 26.4 million euros, while phase two will be co-financed to establish a further four TVET centres at a total of 13 million euros.”
The two leaders who held bilateral talks, and President Kenyatta said he hopes the cooperation and trade partnership between the countries depends, acknowledging that the trade balance is tilted in favor of Germany at the moment, “What we sell to Germany are mostly primary goods and we hope to improve on that,” he said.
On his part, President Steinmeier lauded the developments made by Kenya in the technology field, noting they are willing to partner with tech start ups in Kenya.The leader also spoke about climate change, noting that the invasion of locusts being witnessed in several African nations is just an effect of the climate change conundrum. President Kenyatta said the climate change problem is a global problem and it poses a real threat. Germany’s Head of State said his country will avail 3 million euros to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) to support efforts to tae the desert locusts’ invasion. They also discussed the challenges Kenyans living in Germany and Germans living in Kenya are facing and President Kenyatta said they hope to map out a cooperation framework that will ease day to day operations of the citizens.