How is such a small population so powerful

[Nefertiti]

Btw...I am finding myself working with a lot of Jews in Tech...from places like Ukraine and Russia. Consulting firms like EPAM are mostly Jews...Brilliant...and pretty gels. And lots of Africans. We are making a difference. Not long ago, I needed a backup resources on something I couldn't handle in Silicon Valley. I called the ofc...and while I thought the resource would be Indian...the resource they send was...I kid you not...a young talent from Kiambu and Strathmore...very professional. Kenyanplato...we are present here and now. In my area...I know the difference we are making. If I were to look at areas like healthcare and education I know I will be impressed. In places like Mass where Education is the mainstay of the Economy, Africans are in control. Places like CDC in ATL has a good size of Africans in key areas.

This may well be the case and slowly things will turn around in Africa. I always look at say Nairobi - a 10m population with the GDP of New Hampshire with 700k folks.

About Jews if you have been to Tel Aviv and Haifa - Wadi Valley - you get amazed at the stuff going on there. Crazy culture and work ethic. People say the US favors Israel but when you have the entire roster of Big Tech lined up there something else is at play.

[Wa Njambi]

Robina: That's under the belt to RVP...and I will explain. Sometimes Robina, we are not valued by currency. Got it!. Example....There was a conversation here or RCB or the other mutation...and that is what translated to T of the numbers. PapaF, RVP, Tami, and few others...I think RVP owned the spreadsheet...he pulled it out, we all talked about it....he explained his reasoning and the math. And before we knew it...it was tyranny of the numbers.and just like that...there was opinion polls, Editorials, etc. I credit RVP and PapaF...I know what excel spreadsheet did.

I don't agree. I believe all nationalities and races are unique and have something special to offer. How many Jews play basketball? How many have won marathons? How many have painted masterpieces or composed symphonies?

AGREED..
Just because am not succeeding in minting money does not mean am not successful.

How are you successful if you are not minting money? Please remind us.

[Nefertiti]

Wa Njambi wtf?? MOAS is pseudo-science and the only thing RVP knows. He is a theorist witout application. Still milks his briefcase company to buy "real assets" - land in Mavoko and Mau. The classic Mwafrika.

[KenyanPlato]

Wa Njambi wtf?? MOAS is pseudo-science and the only thing RVP knows. He is a theorist witout application. Still milks his briefcase company to buy "real assets" - land in Mavoko and Mau. The classic Mwafrika.

Robina is Tingisa or AOF alter ego. She been around for a longtime that she know the king of sewer politics pandit lives in eastern cementry called mavoko..he went from mavoko time to advocate Gulu Uganda where he was measuring the effects of kony on poverty..he is now is Swiss Alps washing George Soros knickers

[Nefertiti]

Wa Njambi wtf?? MOAS is pseudo-science and the only thing RVP knows. He is a theorist witout application. Still milks his briefcase company to buy "real assets" - land in Mavoko and Mau. The classic Mwafrika.

Robina is Tingisa or AOF alter ego. She been around for a longtime that she know the king of sewer politics pandit lives in eastern cementry called mavoko..he went from mavoko time to advocate Gulu Uganda where he was measuring the effects of kony on poverty..he is now is Swiss Alps washing George Soros knickers

One doesn't need to read the past blogs to figure Pundit is a fool. How does a techie bother to buy land in Kapsengere? Or truck business. That's waste of capital and talent - he should be rolling out Kimetrica all over Africa. Instead he sold it to build apartments - "real assets".

[KenyanPlato]

Rvp is villager.. Without gumboots and pooping cows he is nobody in his community

[Wa Njambi]

lol...no comments

Wa Njambi wtf?? MOAS is pseudo-science and the only thing RVP knows. He is a theorist witout application. Still milks his briefcase company to buy "real assets" - land in Mavoko and Mau. The classic Mwafrika.

[veritas]

We're all beautiful people and should cherish our marble blue home.

Poverty is a product of politics. Let's not forget Obama is half Kenyan. Even myself with Korean genes, the smartest people I've interacted with have NOT been Koreans or Jews or Anglo-Saxens or South Africans but Kenyans. Right here in this forum. If I had to pick a race that would save the world from gloom and doom that would be Kenyans.

[RV Pundit]

Lets keep it at the Jew. It the same reason Nandi/Keiyos are successfully in marathon running. Economist call it  "economies of scale/consolidations/". Physicist call it "Momentum". Biologist would call it a "thriving ecosystem". Chemist describe the catalyst required to get reaction. Pilot would call it taking off and then enjoying the cruising. In short you'll find all sort of communities or people that excel in something i.e black american in basketaball - because they've build a ecosystem that is bar none (at the moment) for such success. The jew has build an international network of business, financing, academia and the works that thrives. You cannot beat it because you need all the pieces to work together...to beat them require a lot of wiring and tightening all the loose bolts...until you have everything in place. In short - don't give up - work on ticking all the boxes - and take off will happen and everything will cruise at auto-pilot.

Africans should avoid self-defeatist attitude that keep them down. You're down - the only way is literally up. You have to do something and tick the many boxes - if we go by development indicators - there are thousands - and you have to improve nearly all of them - to get such an ecosystem.  You cannot do one thing - and then get frustrated because you didn't get there.

[Nefertiti]

Pundit how many boxes are remaining to be ticked? you said you don't see a demographic dividend in the offing?

Again how come the Chinese ticked the boxes so fast? is our snail pace not tail- chasing?

[RV Pundit]

Boxes to get where...we have few boxes to move from lower middle income country to middle income (4,000 usd per capita). We are now at 2,000usd - a huge jump from when Moi left us at I thin less than 500usd per capita. Now 4-6k is around where South Africa or Botswana are - then we have to jump to 7-8K - around to 12K (lower level to become developed country) and of course we would still be miles away from Western World of 40-50K. But it doable. This won't happen in 10-20 yrs - but we are talking about 40-50yrs for kenya to become a developed world if it sustain it's current path. Target 10-15yrs to become South Africa - another 15-20 years to get out of the middle class trap and become developed. It's doable. It can be done.Chinese is an old civilization - and began it's current modern journey in 1978...so don't think it been fast or easy.

In practical terms - we need to focus on basics - roads, railways, water, sewage, ports - and tick all those boxes like we are nearly ticking electricity access.The hardware is normally the hardest - and once fixed - you really deal with maintenance. You don't rebuild a railway network for example every decade..it last 200yrs.

But we tend to get into interesting software copy-cat debate from first world.

If I was president of kenya I will focus on two things
1) Basic Infrastructure  - bridge the infrastructure deficit. Tarmac all roads. Build commute rail for cities.Provide water & sewage to everyone. Provide electricity to everyone. The add ports, airports, railways, irrigation dams, etc - nice to have - but focus on everyone everywhere having reliable electricity, clean piped water, tarmac road and then leave them alone. We are about achieving universal electricity access..lots of kudos..but our tarmac/paved roads & clean piped water stats are very shameful.

2) High Quality education for young ones. The greatest multiplier or denominator.

Those are the two investments with proven huge long term payoff  that gov/public sector can engage in - I'd leave the rest of the boxes for private sector and individuals to tick off.

Pundit how many boxes are remaining to be ticked? you said you don't see a demographic dividend in the offing?

Again how come the Chinese ticked the boxes so fast? is our snail pace not tail- chasing?

[Nefertiti]

So it is that rough beaten path without any leapfrog? Once we discover how long it has taken to get the dismal infra now... we get into western softwares because we want optimality. So my mention of China or the Tigers is in that context. Why they did turn around or gallop ahead so fast to scare the superpower? Because otherwise I see a dynamism or moving target - that pioneers didn't face - such that we can never catch up without leapfrogs or some mineral windfall.

Say, I question the viability of manufacturing as the middle income enabler ala the West, China and the Tigers. Because there are structural ingredients that are part of the boxes-to-be-ticked required to reap from manufacturing. Which follows that infra like rail may not be so beneficial. I mean your infra premise is pegged on the assumption of manufacturing taking root from it. Right?

What do you think? Am saying if it was simply set up infra, educate folks and voilà... we would have fewer 3rd world countries on the globe. At least that is my thinking when I deride yours and Ruto's borrow & build.

[RV Pundit]

Infrastructure is not for manufacturing.Its for quality of life.Gov is not in business to grow the economy or make money.Its owe it citizen the public service like paved roads, electricity, clean piped water and etc.How you use the road or electricity is upto you.Naturally stuff like manufacturing will follow.We have huge infrastructure deficit that should be priority no 1.It won't pay off immediately so people who take a short term view of development will not appreciate a railway like they called old one lunatic express but 100 yrs later towns have grown along it including Nairobi that began as railway camp.That infrastructure is easy to fix is nonsense..SGR has hit us very hard..we abandoned it at a maize farm.That is 5b dollars investment.We have done 8-12B investment in electricity sector and we are just around 3000mws...to get South Africa level..we need ten times that.

[Nefertiti]

I don't get you clearly. Infra is not about manufacturing but quality of life... is there a distinction? Manufacturing is about the economy which is about quality of life. Then if you were PORK you would close the infra gap as a big tick for growth - lower to upper middle - but it is not government work to grow the economy?

There is no line between "quality of life" and "development" they are synonymous.

[Nefertiti]

But I quite agree about laying tarmack and steel. Many countries had a windfall to finance their infra. Not so sure about borrowing the capital for it.

[RV Pundit]

I see gov role as providing a service first and everything second.Gov doesn't have to do anything about manufacturing but it owes everyone clean piped water, electricity, paved roads, sewage line, telcom& broadband (largely sorted) in addition to security, education and health.Its owes you an airport, a port, railway and other such secondary infrastructure.Now once any gov has delivered on that, private sector and individual are supposed to start or boost manufacturing, farming, gaming software and whatever they fancy on top of the hardware.You should be able build a rental house in mavoko because gov has provided all that...you can start factory in kpasengere because you have electricity, water and roads..you can build your fancy mall in kare because all that is sorted...

[RV Pundit]

But I quite agree about laying tarmack and steel. Many countries had a windfall to finance their infra. Not so sure about borrowing the capital for it.

it's actually not very expensive to build basic infrastructure.Our infrastructure deficit has been studied and quantified.It comes to maybe 80-100b dollars which is doable if you spend 10n annually on it...but we spread ourselves too thin trying to do so many things.Gov has nearly 200-300 parastal n agencies ,some of whom, their core function has nothing to do with gov. Privatize and sell some of them.For example why is Kenya gov still owning shares in commercials bank when central bank can do all their banking Sell KCB..you get a billion dollars.Sell Safaricom you get 4B.Sell likes of Kenya national oil.You can easily get 10-20B dollars from deepen privisation.... enough to kickstart an infrastructure deficit fund and be done with piped water, electricity, paved roads , commuter rails, cargo rails and be left with easy software issues and annual maintenance bill.But now we are giving 1b to miraa, 3 b to sugar, 5b to coffee..which frankly is stupidity.

[Arcadian_Dreamer]

 

He is having his usual manic periods.

Plato is bi polar

Take your meds bwana.

and stop dubbing in white supremacist nonsense.

We don't need bazungus, we never asked for their help, they came to us.

[RV Pundit]

Robina check our 2019 census data for boxes we are ticking and those we aren't...huge progress is being made but still a long way.For example the real electricity access to main electricity is actually 50% not 75% as gov would like to tell us...so we need to connect nearly half the country very fast.

[Higgins the genius]

Robina check our 2019 census data for boxes we are ticking and those we aren't...huge progress is being made but still a long way.For example the real electricity access to main electricity is actually 50% not 75% as gov would like to tell us...so we need to connect nearly half the country very fast.

Pundit, solar power has a coverage of 21%