He will also hold talks with regional leaders on the civil war in South Sudan.
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“This is an historic visit to the African Union”.
He said Africa is looking for ways to strengthen economic ties with the United States in the form of investment and technology transfer, particularly with the signing last month by President Obama of a 10-year extension of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA).
US President Barack Obama landed in Ethiopia on Sunday, beginning a two-day stay and becoming the first American leader to visit Africa’s second most populous nation.
“It is also another concrete step to broaden and deepen the relationship between the AU and the US”, she said.
United States President Barack Obama is set to meet East African leaders during his historical visit to the continent, making him the first sitting US president to visit Ethiopia and the African Union headquarters in Addis Ababa.
During his visit, the US president opened the 6th Global Entrepreneurship Summit, and held bilateral talks with Kenyan officials.
Among the important issues will be skills revolution to provide the youth with employment opportunities; industrialisation and infrastructiural development and agro-processing. “If there is a strong African Union, any help that is provided by the US becomes more effective than us doing things on our own”.
The White House says Obama will raise human rights while in Ethiopia.
“So there is nothing unique about this in the African context” Rice said.
“If you look at AGOA at the moment, just a few countries have made significant benefit out of it and very few products are still trading”.
But Obama said challenges remained and he urged Kenyans, particularly its future leaders, to deal with corruption and tribal conflict, create opportunity for all, improve education and health care, treat women better and confront the threat of terrorism.
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Previous visits of Obama to Africa are: Egypt in June 2009, Ghana in July 2009, South Africa, Senegal and Tanzania in 2013.
