The government should roll out adequate incentives in healthcare to attract high-quality investments and boost medical tourism, a forum heard in Nairobi yesterday.
Speaking at the Kenya Vision 2030 Health and Medical Tourism Conference, participants said the government should fast-track development of incentive packages for local and foreign investors.
“The flow from service delivery firms and private equity funds is consistent but we need to see more incentives provided in order to increase the amount of local and foreign funds coming in for healthcare,” Kenya Healthcare Federation chairman Amit Thakker said.
Private sector healthcare providers said value added tax and duty on imported raw materials for pharmaceuticals should be scrapped to enhance growth in the fledgling domestic manufacturing. They also stressed the need to improve infrastructure for both service delivery and training of medical personnel.
“We would also like the government to provide licenses for the private sector to start training medical personnel, incentives to have urban-rural shifts by the private sector and incentives to start manufacturing inputs in both pharmaceutical and non-pharmaceutical products within the country,” Thakker said.
Health sector data shows that at least 10,000 Kenyans travel abroad for health related purposes spending between Sh7-10 billion annually. The data also shows that between 3,000 and 5,000 foreigners visit the country annually for health-related reasons.
During the third India-Africa summit held in October 2015, President Uhuru Kenyatta promised to help Indian investors keen on developing medical facilities to boost Kenya’s medical tourism, to procure land.
“We would be willing to work with you to see how we can get you land for development. We can work and partner together on a win-win basis, so that is one area I would like you to seriously consider,” Uhuru told the investors.
“We need to cultivate more people coming into the country for healthcare purposes such that in the East African region and even outside the region people know they can get from us what they can get from countries like India or even South Africa,” director-general for Vision Delivery Secretariat Julius Muia said.
“Deliberate incentives are very clear in promoting growth of the healthcare sector,” Muia said.
At the forum KenInvest director general Moses Ikiara urged the sector to come up with specific products both nationally and within the county governments to increase investor sentiment.