Mr Joseph MPUNGA
Senior Investment Promotion Officer
Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa(COMESA)
Zambia
W : www.comesa.int
Industry / Sector
Agriculture & Allied Services, Financial Services, Infrastructure
Personal Profile
Mr. Mpunga is a holder of a master’s degree in Business Administration (MBA) in Project Management from the Maastricht School of Management (MsM), of The Netherlands and a bachelor’s degree in economics from the National University of Rwanda.
He has a vast experience in the private sector and investor facilitation as he served for about 15 years in different capacities as a private investment facilitator and regulator. In his capacity as the Head of One Stop Centre Division at the Rwanda Development Board he contributed to a number of ease of doing business reforms undertaken by his country, Rwanda since a period of almost a decade.
During his tenure as the head of Investment Facilitation/Promotion, he was instrumental in advising the Government in implementing several reforms related to the business reforms agenda that have contributed to make Rwanda one of the leading countries in Africa, in the Ease of doing business. These include, and not limited to the supervision in the establishment of the One Stop Centre for Construction Permits of the Kigali City. He started his career in 90s as a strategic planning officer with the national Ministry of Finance and Strategic Planning. He is a Senior Investment Promotion Officer, within the Industry and Agriculture Division of COMESA, since March 2015.
Company Profile
COMESA began in December 1994 when it was formed to replace the former Preferential Trade Area (PTA) which had existed from the earlier days of 1981. COMESA (as defined by its Treaty) was established ‘as an organisation of free independent sovereign states which have agreed to co-operate in developing their natural and human resources for the good of all their people’ and as such it has a wide-ranging series of objectives which necessarily include in its priorities the promotion of peace and security in the region.
However, due to COMESA’s economic history and background its main focus is on the formation of a large economic and trading unit that is capable of overcoming some of the barriers that are faced by individual states..
COMESA’s current strategy can thus be summed up in the phrase ‘economic prosperity through regional integration’. With its 21 Member States, population of over 583 million a Gross Domestic Product of $805 billion, a global export/import trade in goods worth US$ 324 billion, COMESA forms a major market place for both internal and external trading.
Geographically, COMESA almost two thirds of the African Continent with an area of 12 Million (sq km).