Remittance costs squeeze Africa’s poor.

According to the Africa development bank- ADB, the official remittance flows to the continent grew to a record $60.4 billion in 2012 — overtaking foreign direct investment and official development assistance as the largest external financial source for the first time. Africa is the most expensive continent to send money to, with transfers costing an average of 11.67 percent of the amount being sent, compared with about 8.35 percent for Asia. The global average cost is slightly more than 9 percent. An average transaction cost of 11.6 percent would...

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Slavery conditions in Kenyan flower farms.

Catherine Mumbi knows the difficulties of working in Kenya's flower sector. She was fired as a casual worker at a flower farm after taking time off to recover from complications of the liver. But that was just the start of her problems. "When I felt better I went back but my superior demanded that I have sex with him to keep my job," says Mumbi, who had taken two months off while being hospitalised for her illness. "I declined." "The following morning a watchman knocked on my door with a letter saying my job was over and that I should immediately...

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Smartphones now shake up the website desktop world.

Most users are now accessing their internet through their smartphones and mobile phones, a new research shows. Major internet companies are now adapting to this new trend. Facebook has described itself as a primarily mobile company, and in the past year, saw 30 percent of its revenues come from mobile advertising. Perhaps for Kenyan innovators, this trend too has caught on, with innovations centered around the mobile phone being the new trend. Apps such as MPESA, icow, M-Far, and M-banking are proving to be the new revenue generators for start-ups...

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Narc disowns Mutula's widow.

Narc has disowned Mutula Kilonzo's widow, Nduta Kilonzo, party official Kiema Kilonzo told Easy Fm in an interview.On Sunday, Nduta had announced that she would vie for the senate seat against her step daughter, Kethi Kilonzo, who is expected to vie on a Wiper ticket, a move that is likely to further divide the Kilonzo family....

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KenGen, Kenya Power, Pipeline in hunt for CEOs.

Kengen, Kenya Power, and Kenya Pipeline are in hunt for new CEOs. Eddy Njoroge (Kengen) is expected to resign, Joseph Njoroge (Kenya Power) has been nominated as Principal secretary in the energy docket, and while the contract for Selest Kilinda of Kenya Pipeline came to an end last month.  The cash rich parastatals control billions of shillings directly, and indirectly through the contracts for the many infrastructure projects they undertak...

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Budget to be read on Thursday.

The budget will be read on Thursday. The cabinet secretary for Treasury, Henry Rotich, is expected to unveil the government's fiscal policy for the 2013/2014 financial year. Of key concern will be to watch the government's commitment to devolution, with many analysts keen to see how much will be allocated to the counties. Currently, the senate and national assembly members are embroiled in a dispute over who has the final say on the county budgetary affairs. Analysts will also be watching to see whether there will be an increase in taxes of essential...

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Opinion: Caution must be taken in School's latptops project.

When Erin Hayba began a project to bring computers to solar-powered schools in the world's biggest refugee camp, there were plenty of sceptics. "People said, 'No, this can't happen, you're in a refugee camp, why don't not stick with paper and pencil and chalkboards?'" she recalls. Two years later, there are 215 computers spread among 32 primary, seven secondary and four vocational schools in the Dadaab complex in north-east Kenya, home to more than 400,000 people, mostly from nearby Somalia. Each school has a solar panel. "Many of the youth told...

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Africa registers growth in wealth funds.

Africa is experiencing the strongest growth in new sovereign wealth funds in the world, a newreport by JPMorgan Asset Management shows. During the past two years, 15 state funds have been set up or are being considered in Africa, Patrick Thomson, the global head of sovereigns at JPMorgan Asset told Bloomberg news in an interview. With commodity prices rising, African countries are putting their surpluses into government-owned funds designed to manage a country’s wealth for future generations. Angola set up its $5 billion state...

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Mutula’s widow Nduku Kilonzo joins race for Makueni senate seat.

The late Makueni senator Mutula Kilonzo’s widow Nduku Kilonzo has joined the race to succeed her late husband. This comes barely three days after her step daughter, Kethi Kilonzo, had declared interest in the seat- a move that is likely to split the Mutula family further. She made the announcement in Machakos, after attending a memorial service for the late Machakos Catholic Bishop Urbanus Kioko which was also attended by President Uhuru Kenyatta. Fielding questions from journalists she said; “Yes I confirm to you that I’m in the race.” She...

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Kenya top of US Spying list.

A ranking of countries by the number of interceptions of Internet communication places the country first in Sub-Saharan Africa and second only to Egypt on the continent. Kenya is marked out in yellow on the so-called “world heat map”, alongside oil-rich Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Germany, and the United States with tens of billions of interceptions between them. Sunday’s disclosures are the latest in a series that begun last Thursday when the British newspaper, The Guardian, revealed that the US has been carrying out a top-secret government...

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The right keywords to use on your CV.

Getting a job is hard anywhere in the world the days. Despite all manner of advice we receive on how to get a job, there is simply no one way of getting a job. Stellar grades might work; powerful networks might work, so too is exemplary work and leadership skills. However, increasingly, the all important reason is that your CV doesn’t have the right keywords. Companies’ nowadays automate the CV screening process by using specialized software to look for certain keywords. These applicant-tracking systems, which are used by almost every large employer,...

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HELB to delay disbursing loans.

The Higher Education Loans Board (HELB) says students will have to wait for at least one month before the loans are disbursed, as it is waiting an allocation from Treasury. The  budget will be read this week. In earlier proposed moves, HELB had sought to have the minimum allocation per student increased to kshs.40,000 from the current kshs.60,000, to offset rising inflation. Over 90 percent of public University students that apply for HELB loans are usually allocated loa...

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