The freelance nature in Kenya’s film industry has left many talented practitioners without access to structured retirement benefits.
The Local Authorities Pension Fund (LAPFUND) and the Kenya Film Commission (KFC) convened a consultative meeting on Friday at Sarova Panafric Hotel to explore development of a specialized pension and retirement security product for Kenyan filmmakers.
Representatives from various professional associations and guilds across the Kenyan film sector attended the meeting to discuss one of the most critical gaps in Kenya’s film sector.
According to the participants, the film industry’s freelance nature has left many talented practitioners without access to structured retirement benefits, thus, the initiative seeks to address this challenge as part of wider efforts to enhance pension uptake in Kenya’s informal sector where according to LapFund, more than 70pc of workers lack pension cover.
“Kenya has more than 1,100 pension schemes whereas our neighbour Uganda has only 1 while Tanzania has about 5,” noted Galm Jaldesa, General Manager Strategy & Planning at LapFund.
“We in Kenya have been studying how these other countries have developed customized pension products for the informal sector and our hope is that by onboarding the filmmakers through this initiative we will also broaden our reach to other sectors of the economy.”
With 65 years of experience managing pension funds for government employees, LapFund promises to solve this problem for Kenya’s film industry through a proposed partnership with the Kenya Film Commission.
The fund currently holds Ksh. 71 billion in assets for about 78,000 employees of county governments and other state corporations.
The fund operates as a defined contribution scheme regulated by the Retirement Benefits Authority under the Retirement Benefits Act of 1997.
Further details on the pension scheme’s structure and implementation timeline are expected following the ongoing consultations with industry stakeholders.
