Launched 10 years ago, the single window for foreign trade is one of the flagship projects in Kenya’s development program, Vision 2030. It has already helped secure millions of dollars in license/permit fees and correct the flaws of the manual system.
In August 2021, Kenya started upgrading the Kenya TradeNet System, its trade facilitation platform. According to Ukur Kanacho Yatani, the country’s Treasury Cabinet Secretary, the upgrade will be completed by the end of April 2022.
The government official made the revelation last March 31, during the first East African Trade Facilitation Summit, held in Nairobi under the theme “Re-imagining Trade Facilitation in an era of Technology.”
For Ukur Kanacho Yatani, with the upgrade, “some of the limitations” will be addressed, and “features that were lacking in the Kenya TradeNet system” will be added. They will then “promote the betterment of intra-regional trade as well as significantly make it easy to carry out trade,” he explained.
“As we launch the upgrade of the Kenya TradeNet System, which is also known as the Trade Facilitation Platform, the next 10 years are indeed promising to the trading community,” he added.
The Kenya TradeNet System is a single online platform through which actors involved in international trade and logistics can carry out various trade-related procedures like submitting documents to clear goods and pay taxes and duties.
Launched in January 2011, the system already includes 23 government agencies out of 38 targeted, 38 active insurance companies, 36 banks, nearly 1,529 clearing agents, 46 shipping agents and shipping companies, 29 container freight terminals, and five freight handling companies.
KenTrade, the agency in charge of the platform, reveals that since 2014, more than 3.3 million permits have been issued through the system while over 2.8 million unique consignment references (UCRs) have been processed. As of December 2021, the system had over 16,000 registered users. Partner government agencies were able to collect a little over Ksh3.5 billion (US$30.3 million) in license/permit fees from traders. Also, from May 1, 2018, to June 30, 2021, a total of 445,146 import declarations with values estimated at Ksh2.9 trillion were registered in the system.
Muriel Edjo
