East Africa—Kenya is popular, but a wider story is emerging

The East African Community (EAC) is an emerging economic cluster comprising Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. It aims for economic and political integration between the states, although developments so far remain modest. A customs union was established in 2005, followed by a common market in 2010, but bigger steps are planned, including a common currency (the East African shilling), with the distant possibility that the fi ve states may federalise at some point, creating a single sovereign state that would become the second most populous in Africa.
    Of these countries, Kenya receives the most investor attention. But sentiment is less bullish on its neighbours, which could be a signifi cant missed opportunity. Uganda, for example, averaged GDP growth of 6.9% per year between 1990 and 2009. Rwanda and Tanzania have also expanded rapidly since the early 2000s (7.7% per year in Rwanda, 6.8% in Tanzania). In fact, since 2005, these three EAC countries have been among the fastest growing economies in the world, with annual average growth rates of nearly 8%.
    Looking ahead, Rand Merchant Bank, a South African bank, forecasts that four of the fi ve EAC countries (Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya and Rwanda) now rank in the top twelve most attractive African countries for investment11. It is still early, but the civil strife and economic instability that held these countries back last century has been replaced by sound monetary, fi scal and macroeconomic policy, increasingly open markets, and strengthening institutions. They would well usher in another decade of rapid growth. 
Source:Into Africa, Institutional investor intentions to 2016, An Invest AD report written by the Economist Intelligence Unit