The County Assembly of Siaya has this afternoon ratified the Lake Region Economic Bloc (LREB) by a unanimous vote.

The House has passed The Lake Region Economic Bloc Bill, 2019 making it the latest County Assembly among the Bloc’s 14 member Counties to ratify the Bill.

The Lake Region Economic Bloc (LREB) consists of the 14 counties around Lake Victoria and its environs namely Siaya, Homa Bay, Migori, Kakamega, Bungoma, Busia, Vihiga, Trans Nzoia, Kisii, Nyamira, Bomet, Nandi, Kisumu and Kericho.

The objective of the Bloc is to leverage the economics of scale and shared resources such as Lake Victoria in order to grow the economy of the region and improve the livelihood of the people in these counties.

The Bill seeks to provide a legal framework for member counties on developing policies and programmes aimed at widening and enhancing cooperation in the economic, industrial, social, and technological and research fields.

The development agenda of the Bloc is driven by seven pillars which are agriculture, tourism, education, health, financial services, ICT and Infrastructure to be implemented by respective member counties. Siaya County chairs the education pillar.

The Bloc aims to facilitate access to wider markets, enhance food security, pursue economic growth and joint public investments, and strengthen partnerships with the private sector and mainstream gender and vulnerable groups’ issues.

extolled the membership of the House for granting the bloc legal status, hence giving Siaya County the requisite legal apparatus to interact with the bloc. He further challenged the executive arm of the county government to work closely with the legislative arm in a bid to come up with plans and programmes on how to improve key sectors in the county.