Tanzania

The SIGI Country Report for Tanzania provides a new evidence base to improve the rights and well-being of women and girls in Tanzania and promote gender equality through the elimination of discrimination in social institutions. It builds on the newly collected data – both quantitative and qualitative – on social norms and practices through a rigorous methodology and participatory approach involving a wide range of national and international stakeholders. The report analyses how discriminatory social norms and practices continue to constrain women’s empowerment and restrict their access to opportunities and rights, notably across three key dimensions: their economic situation, their place within the household and their physical integrity and agency over their own body. In the framework of Tanzania’s commitment towards realising Sustainable Development Goal 5 on the promotion of gender equality, the report provides policy recommendations that aim to address gender-based discriminations, transform social norms, promote women’s empowerment and build a truly inclusive society.

Today, the global youth population is at its highest ever and still growing, with the highest proportion of youth living in Africa and Asia, and a majority of them in rural areas. Young people in rural areas face the double challenge of age-specific vulnerabilities and underdevelopment of rural areas. While agriculture absorbs the majority of rural workers in developing countries, low pay and poor working conditions make it difficult to sustain rural livelihoods. Potential job opportunities for rural youth exist in agriculture and along the agri-food value chain, however. Growing populations, urbanisation and rising incomes of the working class are increasing demand for more diverse and higher value added agricultural and food products in Africa and developing Asia. This demand will create a need for off-farm labour, especially in agribusinesses, which tends to be better paid and located in rural areas and secondary towns. It could boost job creation in the food economy provided that local food systems were mobilised to take up the challenge of higher and changing domestic demand for food.

Informal employment, defined through the lack of employment-based social protection, constitutes the bulk of employment in developing countries, and entails a level of vulnerability to poverty and other risks that are borne by all who are dependent on informal work income. Results from the Key Indicators of Informality based on Individuals and their Households database (KIIbIH) show that a disproportionately large number of middle‑class informal economy workers receive remittances. Such results confirm that risk management strategies, such as migration, play a part in minimising the potential risks of informal work for middle‑class informal households who may not be eligible to social assistance. They further suggest that middle‑class informal workers may have a solvent demand for social insurance so that, if informality-robust social insurance schemes were made available to them, remittances could potentially be channelled to finance the extension of social insurance to the informal economy.

This strategic foresight report assesses the interaction between demographics, economic development, climate change and social protection in six countries in East Africa between now and 2065: Ethiopia, Kenya, Mozambique, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia. The report combines population projections with trends in health, urbanisation, migration and climate change and identifies the implications for economic development and poverty. It concludes by identifying policies to address seven grand challenges for social protection planners in national governments and donor agencies which emerge from the projections. These include: eliminating extreme poverty; extending social insurance in a context of high informality; the rapid growth of the working-age population, in particular the youth; adapting social protection to urban settings; protecting the poor from the effects of climate change; harnessing a demographic dividend; and substantially increasing funding for social protection.

This review of investment policy in Tanzania evaluates the current policy situation and makes recommendations for  enabling Tanzania to attract higher investment to exploit its full potential and become a regional trade and investment hub. The review finds that while private investment in Tanzania has considerably risen since the early 1990s, further progress can be made to improve the business climate and attract more investment in key sectors, such as infrastructure and agriculture. Informed by the subsequent chapters of this report, this overview provides policy options to address these challenges. In particular, investors’ rights and obligations could be rationalised and made more accessible and regulations on foreign investment and investment incentives reviewed. The land legislation could be revised and land rights registration accelerated, notably by providing stronger incentives for registration. The short-term and long-term costs and benefits of the regulatory restrictions imposed by crop boards and of export bans could be closely analysed.