An Evaluation of Tanzania’s EPZ Programme–Challenges and Prospects

This study employs OECD-DAC criteria to evaluate the Tanzania EPZ programme over the 2006 to May 2009 period. It is found that the programme is relevant for the country and global developmental orientations although some respondents had a misguided opinion. On the other hand, the programme remains largely ineffective and inefficient due to the prevailing risks including heavy hard and soft infrastructural challenges as well as the existing burden of the fiscal incentive regime.

The study notes however that if properly handled, the uranium discovery holds a potential key to transforming the country’s energy and industrial sectors for domestic and international competitiveness. It is further suggested that unless necessary socioeconomic
interventions are made well in time, the identified weaknesses stand to threaten the programme’s envisaged developmental impact and sustainability. Therefore, it is recommended that the Government (through EPZA) in collaboration with all relevant EPZ stakeholders devise an efficient and effective mechanism for financing export-enhancing infrastructures; and that special purpose vehicles (SPVs) in public-private partnerships (PPPs) arrangements provide one of such options. Other policy measures should include a review for streamlining the incentive regime, addressing inefficiencies at the Dar es Salaam port, financial empowerment for domestic export-oriented SMEs, enhanced stakeholder awareness of the EPZ legislation and practice, and regional and global marketing of the programme’s production/exports.

©2009 by Charles T L T Domician. All rights reserved. Sections of this paper can be quoted without explicit permission from source, only that reference to author is requested. Any views expressed in this document are entirely the author’s, and should in no way be associated to any other institution whatsoever.