I know of a german, who taught some kenyans, how to weld and since his boys are doing a good job, this man is eating life with a big spoon in kenya.

We do have welders in the country but most are Jua Kali artisans who have not done specialized welding apart from your kawaida spot welding of windows and doors (I am not sure that qualifies as welding ). Most of this foreign contractors will require welders who are coded (i.e regularly tested and certified by Lloyds of London or institutions that are permitted by Lloyds). ......There lies the problem. Such institutions are few in Africa. Actually, closest home, the one i know of is in Durban and is owned by Alsthom John Thompson. India and Phillipines have the best and cheapest pool of certified coded welders. As a matter of fact, most British and French companies working outside Europe prefer the Fillipinos. Very disciplined and hardworking lot save for language barrier and they don't come cheap.

True. Kenya Railways had the 2nd best foundry training section in the whole of Africa. It died and with it, the skills and all that potential. A buddy who trained in Foundry left Kenya due to low wages and went to US. He is running an own workshop that is doing jobs for BMW. Sema pesa!!

My experience is that welding robots have limitations and are mostly found in the confines of assembly plants where their work is mostly routine. Plant maintenance comes with unique requirements and thus you would still require plenty of human intervention. I still think that we will not run away from establishing serious trade skills training institutions. In the meantime, the few who have those skills from Technical Schools and Polytechics of yesterday, will continue being in demand and money will surely follow them.

I mean to say that I believe that these technical courses need an industry that can sustain them and in my opinion, the robotics industry can do the trick. Upon some thought I coined the 'Intelligence based Objects Industry'.

Firstly, a country like Kenya appears to have advantages in demographic capital compared to countries like even Germany.

The jua kali sector can be merged with the strong IT and the science based disciplines. It is possible to have such economic reforms that allow distributed manufacture and training - read revamped 'village' polytechnics.

BTW, we are now moving into economies that will tend to require continuous education for all citizens, even for post retirement populations. Sustainability ita toka wapi?

Some punctuation would have made that an easier read.

Had taken a little wine, as you can see, my post was almost midnight, will do my best next time. Also note: We were paying almost 10shillings for a single a few words on the mobile platform a few months back, even here space has value,ku-save nayo!!!

Guka, I think stopping importation would not be a solution because people would just make do with another substandard substitute. In my opinion the best way would be the setting up, implementation and enforcement of standards. In Kenya anybody who wants to build anything builds the way he wants and makes changes along the way as he or she sees fit. Contrast this with developed countries where there are set standards for everything. It is not just that you must have the building plan approved but that when you start to build it there are standards for materials and even processes that have to be followed. There is even a standard for how many misumaris you pigilia when setting the trusses of a roof.

The standards we set do not have to be as stringent as the ones in Western Countries but we can set our and ensure they are followed. This would create a lot of jobs as improvements are made to existing structures to meet standards and new developments are built to acceptable standards.

Standards in built structures would create employment because even though you can import fixtures someone has to physically set it to standard. For example you can have standards for installation of solar power fixtures even when you are importing all the equipment and still create a thriving industry in solar power installation.

I'd blame this on commercialization
of thinking in the civil service.

Example, you will find the Planning & Economic Secretary of Kenya spending 80% of his time in foreign trips raking in per diems, leaving junior economists to do the country plans and policies.

The juniors grow up waiting for promotions so they can do the foreign trips (and build Runda mansions like their former seniors) leaving their new juniors to do the work.

At the end no coherent country plan as no senior did any mentorship to juniors.