Oduor Ong'wen

The actualisation of the East African Community (EAC) Common Market on 1 July 2010 is arguably the most critical step in our regional integration efforts in East Africa.

Thousands of patents on African plants have been filed. These include brazzeine, a protein 500 times sweeter than sugar from a plant in Gabon; teff, the grain used in Ethiopia's flat ‘injera’ bread; and thaumatin, a natural sweetener from a plant in West Africa.

It is easy – indeed tempting – to dismiss the violence that has engulfed Kenya in the last one month as an unfortunate, though not totally unexpected, resurgence of African atavist ontological disposition.