American equipment manufacturer, General Electric, has partnered with Kenya in development of transport facilities, health care, energy and technical training for engineers and technicians.

The company yesterday signed a memorandum of understanding with the Vision 2030 Delivery Secretariat. “We intend to work together in several areas, many of these are in a very early stages of discussion, others to be conceptualized as as we go on,” said Mugo Kibati, the director general of Vision 2030 Delivery Secretariat. General Electric which is already developing two 150 megawatt wind farms has planned refurbishment of rail locomotives in partnership with the Rift Valley Railways as one of the first projects to be undertaken under the partnership.

According to General Electric Africa President Jay Ireland, the partnership entails upgrading of locomotives for efficiency, signaling, environmental friendly operations, and supply of new locomotive units, subject to conclusion of negotiations with RVR. The deal with the Vision 2030 secretariat also involves training of engineers and technicians at the Kenya Railway Institute. “We aspire to be the preferred supplier for the locomotives and signaling capabilities in Kenya and the region,” said Ireland.

In the health sector, GE intends to supply diagnostic and imaging equipment ranging from low cost easy to use medical tools to complicated and expensive machines depending on the needs. GE is working out a deal to partner with Numerical Machining complex to boost the state corporations capacity for delivery on its mandate of producing spare parts and possibly whole engines for industrial use. “These are the core enablers for industrialization without which we can not engage in manufacturing as envisaged in the vision 2030. This capacity building is the precursor to large scale manufacturing within the country and for the entire region. These some of the institutions that will give us the tools to eject more light into in the process of implementing vision 2030,” said Kibati.

The Numerical Machining Complex had its most popular product, the Nyayo Car christened Nyayo Pioneer1 prematurely halted with the prototype remaining locked up for years and the plant closed until it was revived 2006.