The Pharmaceutical Society of Kenya (PSK) has outlined plans to mentor and provide career guidance support to KCPE achievers wishing to pursue a career in Pharmacy. The umbrella Pharmacists professional society while welcoming top KCPE candidate Olive Mwea Wachira’s wish to pursue a career in the field, said they have already drawn up plans to orient candidates wishing to join the profession. Speaking at Riara Primary School when he led a team of practicing pharmacists to congratulate Olive Mwea on her achievement as one of the top two candidates who scored 453 out of a possible 500 marks, PSK Chair,…
Author: NBM CORRESPONDENT
Volatility in commodity markets is likely to increase over the next few months, and this could lead to greater civil unrest – especially in the developing world – which could require military intervention. This recently happened in Tanzania over the pricing of its 2018 cashew nut harvest. The warning comes from UWIN (Unleashing the Wealth in Nations), a new blockchain business aiming to transform farming and commodity trading in Africa and other parts of the developing world. “The current cashew nut price crisis in Tanzania, where the president ordered the army to buy the country’s 2018 nut harvest thereby diffusing…
mKey, an app that converges social and financial services into an integrated lifestyle, has recorded close to 100,000 downloads since its official launch in early September. Finserve, the fintech that operates mKey, has reported that as at the end of October 99,970 users had downloaded the keyboard app with 309 000 transactions worth Sh17.8 million having been processed over this period. Keyboard app is what enables an app to learn automatically and predict the next word that the user intends to type. mKey additionally processed loans worth Sh5.2 million over the same period. mKey app is targeted at Kenya’s increasingly…
BitPesa (BTC Africa), the pan-African digital payment platform has partnered up with Sompo Holdings, one of the major Japanese insurance companies, to lower the costs incurred and increase the speed of payments to and from frontier markets, including international remittances across Europe and Africa. The partnership came after Sompo Holdings invested Sh515 million (570 million yen) to acquire a 10% stake of Bitpesa. The partnership aims to further increase global trade and encourage the digitalization of international financial services. According to Sompo Holdings, BitPesa’s technology, which was developed through thorough experiments in remittances and settlements, will be able to help…
By 2030, Africa will be home to 32% of the World’s under 30 population by year 2030 and will also have the largest working age population by 2035. Yet, today’s youth unemployment in Africa is up to three times higher than adult unemployment. This is why Hewlett Packard has introduced the HP LIFE centre. HP LIFE offers free online learning for users to gain the skills to start and grow their own business or improve their employment opportunities. Building on the success of this global program, HP is working with partners to open technology-enabled HP LIFE innovation centres to further…
Germany luxury apparel brand Hugo Boss has entered the Kenyan market as it moves to tap the growing demand for designer fashion brands among the middle class population. The company, which has had a presence in the Kenyan market for over 20 years, has opened its first store at Westgate Mall, through the local partner Fazal Group, where they expect to attract more affluent customers and expatriates. Mr Andreas Pfeiffer, the team leader for sales in direct markets, says Kenya is the 27th African country to host a HUGO BOSS store. “We have started with men’s line as the anchor in Kenya as…
Family Bank’s performance has continued on an upward trajectory registering a Sh187.8 million net profits in the nine months ending September 30, 2018. This has been largely driven by a drive in digital banking that has seen growth in credit uptake through the revamped PesaPap as well as continued improved operation efficiency that has resulted in cost containment for the bank. The Bank’s profit position for the nine months ended September is a remarkable turnaround from the same period last year when it registered a loss of Sh743.1 million. Net loans and advances to customers grew by Sh190.8 million to…
The African Development Bank (AfDB) has finally approved additional loans worth Sh27.5 billion (£235 million) for the completion of the Thwake River Dam project in southern Kenya. The additional loan package comprises of Sh22.5 billion (£192.5 million) which will come from AfDB while the rest Sh5 billion (£430million) will be from the Africa Growing Together Fund (AGTF), a fund that was created by both AfDB and China to finance public and private development projects in the African continent. This additional assistance follows another loan that was granted by AfDB in 2013 to start building the dam, which is part of…
The ability of Nielsen’s 7th Africa Prospects Indicator (APi) report to provide a definitive profile of performance and clear country comparisons is evident in the latest edition, which shows that all eight countries in the overall country ranking, shuffled position at the mid-year mark, the first time this has occurred in nearly four years. The overall APi indicator ranking is created from macro, business, consumer and retail indicators, to create an overall indicator based on nine common datasets and 12 weighting calculations to determine the relative indicators for each of the individual dimensions. “What is increasingly evident, is that no country is…
By David Wanjala The year 2018 has been a tough one for Kenyans financially. The effects of the capping of interest rates on loans from commercial banks continued to bite, stagnating growth especially in the SMEs as banks preferred trading with government securities that are considered safer. Investing in the stock market has had its fare share of downs. As at the early weeks of December, it was reported that close to a third of the listed companies had shed a total of Sh14 billion in their first half-year net earnings. Athi River Mining and Deacons have gone into receivership because…