CABINET MEETS

The Cabinet met on Thursday morning at State House Nairobi, and approved the rationalization and harmonization of hardship areas and payment of hardship allowances to teachers and civil servants.

The Cabinet also approved new criteria for establishing the designation of a hardship area.

"The new list of hardship areas will be gazetted while a list of areas that have been degazetted due to the development that has taken place since they were last gazetted will also be published," a statement from Presidential Press Service said.

Prior to the harmonization there was a different criteria used to pay hardship allowances for teachers and civil servants.

The Cabinet that met under the Chairmanship of President Mwai Kibaki at State House Nairobi also authorized the hosting of the South-South Summit in Nairobi this December.

The summit that will bring together several heads of state and government and ministers will discuss strategies for expanding co-operation between developing nations.

The meeting also approved Kenya's participation in the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) on compliance in human rights instruments. The review will take place next year.

The UPR was created by the U.N. General Assembly to review the human rights record of all member countries by 2011. Following today's approval a national report on Kenya will now be prepared.

The Cabinet also approved an extension of the Government of Kenya technical co-operation agreement in training and capacity building for the Government of Southern Sudan. The extension shall be for a period of two years and will cost US$ 2.8 million.

The Cabinet has also approved the revision of the Consumer Price Index (CPI) computation methodology from the arithmetic means to the geometric means effective October this year.

The Kenyan public will be sensitized on the advantages of the superior geometric means of computation.

The meeting also approved the offer by Kenya to host the Comesa Monetary Institute at the Kenya School of Monetary Studies and also gave a green light for the hosting of a conference by Ministers of Education drawn from African Union member states in November this year.