Kenya has ranked position 115 out of 152 in the Competitive Industrial Performance (CIP) Index Report, 2020.
This rank puts the country lower than other competitor African countries but high compared to its East African counterparts. Egypt and South Africa rank at position 64 and 52 respectively whereas Tanzania is 123 and Uganda is position 128.
The report acts as a benchmark of the ability of countries to produce and export manufactured goods competitively. It provides a yardstick against which Kenya can compare its manufacturing competitiveness on a global level.
It further indicates that China, which is ranked second in the CIP Index report, is very strong in manufacturing due to the use of high technology which is applied by 30.6% of its manufacturers whereas only 9.3% are resource-based manufacturers. The Kenyan manufacturing sector export structure on the other hand is dependent on resource-based manufacturers at 42.9% with high tech manufactures only accounting to 5.5%.
The Principal Secretary Ministry of Industrialization, Dr. Francis Owino, had this to say, “This report shows Kenya is at position 115 out of 152. This is far from our expectations and calls for urgent need to collaborate to achieve faster growth in the sector. We will continue to collaborate with various stakeholders to achieve targets in the policy making formula to get Kenya in the global competitiveness map.”