International Trade Centre (ITC) Coordinator of Supporting Indian Trade and Investment for Africa (SITA) Project Office for Asia and the Pacific, Mr. Govind Venuprasad, Visited COMESA/LLPI on May 5, 2015.
The purpose of the visit was to tailor modalities of collaboration between COMESA/LLPI and ITC-SITA on leather development activities in East Africa.
During the visit, Mr. Govind met COMESA/LLPI Experts Team led by Prof. Mwinyikione Mwinyihija, Executive Director of LLPI. The ED welcomed the ITC-SITA guest to COMESA/LLPI
Mr. Nicholas Mudungwe, Cluster Development Expert at COMESA/LLPI, gave a brief overview of COMESA/LLPI’s historical background and mandate, the importance of the leather sector for the region and the activities that the institute is conducting to enable the Region benefit from this huge potential. The relationship that the Institute has with ITC and activities accomplished under PACT II program were also presented.
Mr. Govind Venuprasad, gave background information of ITC-SITA. He said that ITC came with the project Supporting Indian Trade and Investment for Africa (SITA) that initially identified 25 possible sectors that later on were brought to 8, one of which is leather. From the leather value chain, the SITA project focuses only on tanneries, and three countries namely Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania are considered. Mr. Venuprasad, after indicating the existence of a Team of Experts from ITC-SITA side regarding the leather sector, expressed the ITC-SITA interest to work with COMESA/LLPI.
In the discussion that followed the briefings from both sides, the proposed collaboration between the two institutions for the implementation of SITA leather project was very much welcomed. It was agreed to work out the details of the work program and implementation schedule with the concerned ITC-SITA Expert Team.
