Mombasa Apparels, a Kenya-based garment company, has opened a factory, set up at a cost of Sh2.2 billion, in Kenya’s coastal town of Mtwapa, Kilifi County.
The new factory is expected to create 3,000 jobs and would manufacture garments for the international market, and is a part of the Kenyan Government’s ongoing effort to position the East African nation as an industrial investments destination.
Speaking during the official opening of the garment factory, Industrialization and Enterprise Development Cabinet Secretary Adan Mohamed said such investments in the textiles and apparel sector are a clear demonstration of the growing investor confidence.
The Kenyan Government is deliberately focusing on labour intensive sectors that are key drivers in job creation and industrialization, besides attracting foreign investments, he added.
Mohamed said Kenya has managed to spring up as the leading and largest exporter under the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) program in Sub-Saharan Africa, with a turnover of US$ 300 million and creating around 10,000 direct jobs in the apparel sector, in 2014.
Mohamed assured that the Kenyan Government will remain committed to making provisions to support the sector by focusing on strategic interventions that will improve the operating environment which includes subsidizing the cost of power in order to ensure that investors are able to create more employment opportunities for the people.
Mohamed said many industrialized nations have had the textile and apparel sectors as their pioneer sectors to industrialization.
Representatives of several global textiles and apparel companies are currently in Kenya, to participate in the ongoing Origin Africa, a Pan-African event organized by the African Cotton and Textile Industries Federation in collaboration with the Ministry of Industrialization and other local and international players. (GK)
