Position of Tanzania in Sub-Saharan Africa in the implementation of Local Economic Development

By Nyasigo Kornel

Tanzania has achieved an excellence in Local Economic Development (LED) to the ground of practice where Primary Education Development Program and Municipal managements have been sited as practice examples. Unlike other Sub Saharan Africa countries who have done better in policy and legislative framework, yet lack ground practices.

Shortly after presentations made in Africa Local Government Action Forum (ALGAF), the Director of Ilala Municipal sited some examples that Tanzania have adopted as action steps to practice LED. He sited Tanzania Primary Education Development Program (PEDP) reform in Tanzania as well as action taken by Municipals to bid the city cleaning activities to the local partner.

In order to create decent job to the citizens and maintain sustainable development in the country Local Economic Development (LED) is an essential process to undertake. In the LED, local governments and community based groups manage their existing resources and enter into partnership arrangements with private sector to create new jobs and stimulate economic activities.


PEDP is one of the most ambitious reforms undertaken in Tanzania in recent years. It aims to provide access to quality education for all, with specific institutional measures to ensure increased participation and better accountability.

The Ministry of Education and Culture, therefore has recognized the need to embark on the strategy to streamline and strengthen its core functions of policy formulation, co-ordination, monitoring, and evaluation of Adult and Non-Formal Education to ensure that all out-of-school children, illiterate youth and adults get the best quality education.

The provision of quality of education to this target group will contribute to the creation of a lifelong learning society, improvement of people’s livelihoods, an increased awareness and prevention of HIV/AIDS, gender and environmental issues, good governance, sustained social and economic development of the country and to poverty eradication.

According to Andres Rodriuez of London School of Economics who did research on Sub Saharan Africa, Led has become often identified with self-reliance, survival, and poverty alleviation, rather than participation in the global economy, competitiveness, and finding market niches.

Ugandans seem to make a lot of cries into this by claiming that foreign entrepreneurships where in favour to grow beyond local private sectors due to the unjustified policies. The contributor cited the growth of coca cola to the local beverages.

In South Africa the policies and legislative framework are yet in place but very little has been done to make these policies and legal frameworks to be pro-poor LED, and Led is unevenly developed and operationalized across the country, says Etienne Nel and Ian Goldman of Rhodes University.

‘The key pro-poor interventions are in small business support, community- tourism, providing township business centers, market and urban agriculture,” says Etienne Nel.

In Ghana local private sectors, especially in beverage industries are supported by the LED policies where by only local beverages are advocated for use in the sponsored public boarding schools.

One contributor form Ghana says, “In the government purchase, local private sectors are given first priority.”

Through videoconference that took place at Tanzania Global Development and Learning Centre (TGDLC), Andres Rodriuez agrees that LED can indeed be complemented, if not an alternative, to existing development strategies in the Sub Saharan Africa context.

He concludes that LED can provide a more flexible and effective approach to simultaneously enhance economic growth and reduce poverty across Sub Saharan Africa.



Nyasigo Kornel is a Communication Officer of Health and Poverty Resource Centre (HPRC) and an experienced journalist

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