{"id":97076,"date":"2024-09-27T16:04:17","date_gmt":"2024-09-27T16:04:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/index.php\/2024\/09\/27\/kenya-yet-to-exploit-its-maritime-resources\/"},"modified":"2024-09-27T16:04:17","modified_gmt":"2024-09-27T16:04:17","slug":"kenya-yet-to-exploit-its-maritime-resources","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/kenya-yet-to-exploit-its-maritime-resources\/","title":{"rendered":"Kenya yet to exploit its maritime resources\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Kenya is just nibbling at the shipping, fishing, mining, tourism and sports opportunities offered by its seas, lakes and ocean access, equivalent to more than 31 extra counties in surface area.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Ambassador Nancy Karigithu, Special Advisor on Blue Economy at the Executive Office of the President of Kenya, says the Indian Ocean waters bodies stretch from the shore line (as per international conventions) and could mean an area equivalent to 31 more counties.<\/p>\n

Other liquid estates include Lake Victoria, the third largest fresh water lake in the world (after Caspian Sea in Russia and Lake Superior (Canada and United States. Lake Turkana, also called the Jade Sea, has a lot of unexploited resources\u00a0 \u00a0\u2013 enormous potential in tourism and fisheries. \u201cWe have unique water bodies that remain unexploited,\u2019 she said during the International Maritime Day.<\/p>\n

According to the Secretary-General, International Maritime Organization (IMO) Arsenio Dominguez this year\u2019s World Maritime Day themed: \u201cNavigating the future: safety first!\u201d<\/em> calls for collective effort to ensure we keep pace with the ongoing transformation in shipping\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd at IMO, we must ensure the continued development and implementation of the regulatory regime to prioritize safety as we steer towards tomorrow,\u201d he said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Karigithu said Kenya has incredible resources with opportunities to exploit food, tourism, transport, aqua culture which can create jobs and boost exports among others.<\/p>\n

She described the Blue Economy as a generic term that describes economic exploitation of oceans, inland water bodies and seas.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe world should be called Planet Ocean and not Planet Earth. About 71 per cent of the world is water even when you exclude inland waters. We are told that we don\u2019t know half of the resources available under the sea, \u00a0\u00a0both living and non-living assets,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

She commended Mount Kenya University (MKU) for gaining accreditation of its new Malindi Maritime Academy from the Kenya Maritime Authority in Malindi town.\u00a0 She appealed to the private sector to do feasibility studies on investment opportunities in water bodies, such as cottage industries to support this sector.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are headed for automation, but there is still a demand for skilled workers,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

On gender, Karigithu said the shipping industry has been a man\u2019s world. Only two percent of seafarers globally are women, yet the world cannot transform with only men (half the gender).<\/p>\n

She said South Korea\u2019s industrialization relied heavily from the experiences, connections, training and investments from its workers in the global maritime industry.<\/p>\n

Challenges <\/strong><\/p>\n

Karigithu admitted that there are many drawbacks in the sector. \u201cMost seas are under no man\u2019s jurisdiction and there governance issues. There is ongoing digitization and cybersecurity issues. How do we navigate into the future while keeping an eye on the ball?\u201d<\/p>\n

For instance, in June 2017, a Cyberattack on logistics company Maersk affected shipping terminals worldwide and even led to the shutdown of the Port of Los Angeles, one of the largest cargo terminals, in the world for a few days. Operations were disrupted, ports closed and Maersk resulted to conducting business on paper just to get goods moving from ships to the shore again. The attack cost the Danish shipping giant $300 million (Ksh 38.7 billion), and it has definitely changed the way the shipping industry looks at cybersecurity.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are interconnected as a global community and shipping is vital,\u201d Karigithu observed. \u00a0In March 2021, the Suez Canal was blocked for six days by the Ever Given<\/em>, a container ship that had run aground in the canal.\u00a0 By 28 March, at least 369 ships were queuing to pass through the canal, stranding an estimated US$9.6 billion worth of trade. Kenya\u2019s imports and exports delayed, causing millions in losses.<\/p>\n

Technology transfer issues\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

Karigithu says there is a whole lot of research that will involve experts in future (maritime workers) which Kenya lacks at the moment. Ongoing technology changes in the shipping industry means training and re-training of staff.<\/p>\n

And whereas the future is in clean and green fuels, information is lacking.\u00a0 The new fuels means the transportation, production, storage and the whole supply chain changes. We need new standards at the ports. A whole new research on the implications for Kenya is needed.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe may not the resources as the developing world, so IMO (International Maritime Authority, the\u00a0\u00a0 global maritime standards and rules setting body) must come up with a balance of changes and time limits so that the developed and undeveloped countries move together.\u00a0 Unfortunately, Africa is caught up in international funding bottlenecks that limit access to finance.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The post Kenya yet to exploit its maritime resources\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/a> first appeared on KBC<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The post Kenya yet to exploit its maritime resources\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/a> appeared first on KBC<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kenya is just nibbling at the shipping, fishing, mining, tourism and sports opportunities offered by its seas, lakes and ocean access, equivalent to more than 31 extra counties in surface area. Ambassador Nancy Karigithu, Special Advisor on Blue Economy at the Executive Office of the President of Kenya, says the Indian Ocean waters bodies stretch […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-97076","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97076","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97076"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97076\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97076"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97076"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97076"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}