16th National Competitiveness Forum (NCF) 2025

The National Competitiveness Forum (NCF) is a Public-Private Sector dialogue platform aimed at communicating the national competitiveness agenda and generating inputs for the national annual budget process.

This year’s Forum, the 16th in a series was held under the theme: “Leveraging regional opportunities to grow food processing and animal feeds sectors in Uganda” at Golf Course Hotel, Kampala.

The objectives of the 16^th NCF were to: Explore new insights, opportunities and best practices to position Uganda’s processed food and animal feeds sector for regional trade opportunities, in addition to highlighting experiences by Ugandan processed food and feeds exporting companies in accessing regional markets.

The stakeholders were also expected to propose actionable recommendations to boost private sector entry and participation in the regional markets.

In his opening remarks, the Minister of State for Planning, Amos Lugoloobi said the theme is in line with Government of Uganda’s objective of enhancing value addition on agricultural commodities under the Agro-industrialization pillar of the Tenfold Growth Strategy that seeks to propel Uganda’s GDP to US$500 billion by the year 2040.

He said this will be achieved partly by increasing the export value of agro-industrial products to US$20 billion annually (5-fold), noting that implementation of the Tenfold Growth Strategy is aligned to the framework of fourth National Development Plan.

“Uganda’s formal exports of compounded animal feed amount to 3,144 tons valued at US$1.0 million while imports amount to 136,878 tons valued at US$52 million: This calls for rapid implementation of the import replacement and export promotion strategies. 40% of the animal feeds exports go within the EAC region while the 60% is traded in Uganda,” said Lugoloobi.

The Minister however, noted that the country still lacks enough capacity to produce high quality processed food and animal premixes, attracting significant amounts of imports for high-quality processed food and animal feeds inputs.

“This therefore shows that going forward, issues to do with value addition are non–negotiable. We must invest more in high quality processing to guarantee quality, product standardization, and packaging for food and feeds to easily access regional markets,” said the Minister.

Lugoloobi also noted that strengthening market intelligence and export facilitation is important for the private sector to know the demand dynamics, trade routes, regulatory changes, and competitor landscapes in the regional markets.

To address some of the challenges, the Minister said Government has launched the Economic and Commercial Diplomacy (ECD) Strategy aimed at leveraging foreign missions to collect market intelligence for our export and investment mobilization.

He also said Government has acquired a USD 96 million loan under the INVITE Project, USD 104 million grant and USD 18 million as part of Multi Donor Trust Fund in a bid to grow exports of manufactured products in line with the Tenfold Growth Strategy.

Earlier, the Deputy Secretary to the Treasury (DST), Patrick Ocailap delivered a keynote address on the Regional Opportunities for Uganda's Agro-processed Exports. 

Ocailap said there is need to establish a competitive animal feeds industry to take advantage of the locally available raw materials such as maize, soybeans, sunflower, cottonseed, cassava, sweet potatoes and fish meal to produce high quality and affordable compounded animal feed.

He said the rising incomes, rapid urbanization, and a growing middle class across Africa are driving soaring demand for processed foods and animal proteins, adding that by 2040, demand for processed foods is projected to increase sevenfold.

He noted that Uganda already exports 58% of its products to Africa, with over half of animal feeds destined for regional markets.

Ocailap said the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) further expands this opportunity, providing access to 1.4 billion people with a combined GDP of over USD 3 trillion.

The DST said already, Government through the Parish Development Model (PDM) has disbursed 3.209 trillion as of October 2025 to 3.251 million beneficiaries.

He said by end of FY 2024/25, shs 350.3 billion had been allocated to piggery, shs. 334.2 billion to coffee, shs. 325.8 billion to poultry, shs. 289 billion to goats, shs. 247.9 billion to maize, shs.135 billion to beef cattle, shs. 154.4 billion to banana production and shs. 134 billion to cassava production, among others.

"This continues to boost production, creating backward linkages with small holder farmers and creating opportunities for value addition," said Ocailap.

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM THE FORUM:

1. 1. To address the issue of unreliable and high-power costs, the Forum recommended that Uganda Electricity Distribution Company Limited (UEDCL) should work with Ministry of Energy and Mineral Development (MEMD) to prioritize procurement of needed equipment to modernise the grid to guarantee reliable and affordable power. Firms should also take advantage of the midnight to 6:00am window to benefit from cheap power at 200sh per KWh.

1. 2. On logistical issues with regional exports including transport costs, and border inefficiencies, it was recommended that priority should be given to the multimodal logistical (rail, air cargo, road) infrastructure to improve competitiveness, in addition to supporting Uganda Airlines with additional cargo planes and fast tracking the construction of standard gauge railway (SGR) and completion of the metre gauge railway (MGR) rehabilitation.

1. 3. Regarding the high cost of product certification by Uganda National Bureau of Standards (UNBS) and the low certification capacity, the Forum agreed that Government should review UNBS financing model to enable subsidized product certification processes. They also endorsed increasing UNBS funding to recruit more staff for timely certification processes.

1. 4. On limited investment in development of skills in animal feed technology, it was recommended that training programs for feed technologists should be developed to support the development of new animal feed products for enhanced product spaces.

1. 5. To address the issue of limited access to affordable export finance to invest in processing of food items for export, the solution is to leverage INVITE Project, and other donor interventions to boost private investments in food processing.