BACKGROUND
The Uganda Government embraced the SEZ (Special Economic Zone) ideology after 2000 and by 2004 the activities for the establishment of the first SEZ at Namanve in Mukono District were commissioned.
The Incentives to promote investment in Uganda, as established by Government, are aimed at making investment in the country a best option based on tax incentives. These incentives are contained in the investment code under Uganda Investment Authority. The table below gives at a glance some of these incentives.
Table: Fiscal and Other Arrangements for Investors in Uganda
| Incentive | Target |
| Standard Corporation Tax Rate | 30.00% |
| Standard capital allowances | 50% initial allowance on plant and |
| machinery for urban areas and 75% | |
| elsewhere | |
| Import Duties | Capital equipment is wholly exempt from |
| import duty under the harmonized Tariff | |
| Code. Other related machinery or | |
| equipment is concessionally rated under the | |
| Tariff Code | |
| Duty Drawback | Entitlement to a drawback of duties on |
| imported inputs used in producing goods | |
| for export. | |
| Export Duties | No export duties |
| VAT | 17% standard rate |
| Foreign ownership | 100% foreign ownership permitted |
| Foreign workers | Initial quota of expatriates. Additional |
| allowance where need is demonstrated | |
| Foreign exchange | No exchange control restrictions |
| Repatriation of profit | No restrictions |
| Land Ownership | Available on lease for up to 99 years |
IT PARK
The Information Technology Park is the portion of the Special Economic Zone gazetted for Information Technology projects. To facilitate this, the Park will be connected to two high speed fibre links (up to 1.2 TB/s ) to the outside world as well as to redundant power lines to ensure business continuity which is much needed in today's competitive world.
LAVIT has chosen four key projects to kick start the development at the Park that will provide cutting edge services to both local and international clientele as well as to stimulate growth for subsequent projects.
These projects represent some of the most urgent services whose demand is already existent in the region at the moment and we are sure there couldn't be a better time to invest in them than now.
These projects include :-
- Data Centre
- Fibre MAN
- Jinja University Of Science and Technology
- Internet Exchange Point
These are covered in detail below.
Data Centre
With the world moving into the information age, fast access to information is inevitable for proper business growth. Also with the Internet shifting to the localization phase where local content is emphasized and the landing of two fibre cables LAVIT firmly believes that investment in a High Tech Data Centre is a very attractive venture.
Currently we have a lot of content providers like newspapers who host their websites overseas because of the cost and reliability of local hosting. We believe with an ultra modern Data Centre we shall see a paradigm shift from Overseas hosted services to harnessing the power of Data Centres like ours to deliver timely information to the public without worries of latency.
International Content providers like Google are also moving to provide content to local communities by establishing cache's near their target market; currently there are only two such cache's in Africa and we are optimistic that the arrival of Fibre cable into East Africa also helps make Uganda a preferred hosting destination for both locals and multinationals.
Fibre - Metropolitan Area Network (MAN)
Uganda, like many developing countries is still grappling with issues of Last Mile connectivity; currently Wimax is widely deployed although the obvious problems like the fact that it's still being developed which comes with a lot of incompatibility issues as well as the high Total Cost of ownership (TCO) which stems from operational and maintenance costs as well as upgrade every couple of years makes it a moot choice of technology.
LAVIT firmly believes that a Metro Fibre backbone in the town of Jinja will be a very worth investment considering that currently every Telecom company has to dig up their own fibre which mean transferring the cost to the final consumers let alone the half hazard manner of cable laying which results into intermittent connections because of road construction among other things.
Considering The Geneva 2006 (GE06) Agreement (Digital Broadcasting Migration), and the reasons above, we believe investing in a Fibre backbone will be a model design that the government can replicate in other districts of Uganda notwithstanding the monetary value that it will bring when the migration and introduction of services like IPTV start being enforced by the Communications Commission. The self healing nature of the rings planned will make our MAN infrastructure preferable to even the existing Telecom companies.
Internet Exchange Point (IXP)
An Internet Exchange point is a place where Internet service providers (ISP's) meet to exchange traffic. Uganda already has a 12 peer Internet Exchange Point that is running in Kampala on a free-to-peer model. This model has been criticized by many who are interested in using the Exchange Point for their business needs and has left them frustrated as they are unable to find a facility that can provide the network, power redundancy and fast access to services that meets their clients need.
Also the IXP has been considering the possibility of a Disaster Recovery site for the current exchange point and also having an alternative peering point. We believe that the Data Centre and the Metro fibre provide just what we need to setup a commercially competitive exchange point.
Because Jinja is strategically located near where the Tanzanian and Kenyan Fibre loops terminate into Uganda, we see this Exchange point poised to be the regional Exchange point where content providers like the newspapers and Google would definitely want to be close to – The multi functional role of this exchange point makes it just what the rest of the East African region is looking for to share traffic at regional level, making this investment very timely.
Jinja University Of Science and Technology (JUST)
Governments Worldwide are increasingly recognizing the need to facilitate access to public services to citizens, businesses and industry through the use of Information and communications technology (ICT). Like many of these countries that have ventured into IT and BPO's we believe providing appropriate education will be a stepping stone into the IT economy.
We dream of a modern Institute of Technology that through the quality of facilities, well formulated and open curriculum development will compete with the other Training Institutions in the country. we hope to achieve this by availing state-of-the-art training facilities and an open curriculum development model that turns out graduates that are adequately equipped for the job market and bring the kind of credibility that the institution needs.
Currently most of the ICT Training Institutions are located in Kampala (the Capital) which is now being strained in many ways that the quality of education administered is dissipating. We anticipate that state-of-the-art facilities and administration of proper training will make the JUST a competitive Training ground outside the already congested capital