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The signing aims to foster closer collaboration in areas such as leadership and governance, education, and digitalisation.
Prime Minister of Singapore Lee Hsien Loong has signed several memoranda of understanding (MoUs) with Kenyan President William Samoei Ruto on a working visit to Kenya.
In PM Lee's first official visit to the nation, the two leaders reaffirmed the warm and longstanding relations between Singapore and Kenya, and discussed new areas of cooperation — including human capital development.
The signed MoU on skills development aims to encourage closer technical cooperation between both countries in areas such as leadership and governance, education, and digitalisation. This will take place through knowledge exchange, capacity-building courses, and other cooperation.
PM Lee and President Ruto also signed other MoUs, such as one on information and communication technologies, which would allow both nations to exchange best practices and knowledge in ICT, and promote talent development and innovations. The MoU will also facilitate and strengthen strategic cooperation in cybersecurity.
The last MoU on carbon credits collaboration under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, aims to encourage, develop, and facilitate collaborative carbon credits projects of mutual interest. As PM Lee affirmed, "international collaboration such as this agreement between Singapore and Kenya, is critical to promoting global climate action to achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement".
Speaking at a joint press conference on 18 May 2023 at the State House in Nairobi, PM Lee shared how economic cooperation has been growing, especially with Kenya as one of Singapore’s important trading partners in Sub-Saharan Africa. Despite COVID-19, bilateral trade in 2021 increased by almost a quarter year-on-year. Several Singapore companies are also operating in Kenya in a variety of sectors, such as shipping, logistics and port management systems, agribusiness, hospitality, and Fintech solutions, amongst others.
PM Lee remarked: "Despite being geographically quite distant, Singapore and Kenya have similar outlooks. Our peoples share similar aspirations, such as inclusive growth, a high standard of living, ethnic and religious harmony, and good housing, healthcare, and education. We share similar views on the challenges faced by the Global South. We both worry about growing geopolitical tensions, rising protectionism, threats to the multilateral trading system, inflation, pandemics, and climate change.
"We agreed that it was important that countries continue to work towards building linkages in the digital economy, cooperating on food, energy security, and sustainable development."
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Lead image / President William Samoei Ruto Facebook
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