One factor that dominated candidate-marketing during the presidential election campaigns was the pledge to prioritise agriculture. Yet it was no more than that: a marketing tact to appeal to the majority rather than a fact-based long-term transformation strategy.
From hoes, Naads money, seedlings, Maputo Declaration, sub-county stores, youth funds, women funds, taxes on inputs, mechanisation, agricultural bank, …no discernible strategy emerges that gives Ugandans hope for the life envisaged in Vision 2040.
A casual dissection of the pledges during the campaigns reveals that as a country, our perception of agriculture is yet to rise above the typical rat-race that the sector has been condemned to, the backbone rhetoric notwithstanding.
The criticism of President Museveni’s pledge of hoes was instructive and misplaced at the same time. Misplaced criticism because the hoe remains a key farm tool, even at the highest level of mechanisation. Instructive criticism in the sense that it reveals the plight of the farmer, the supposed force behind the backbone of our economy.
If our agriculture is such that a farmer cannot afford to buy a hoe, which costs Shs8,000-20,000, then even giving him 20 hoes will not make a difference. This explains the negative reactions that greeted President Museveni’s pledge. Increasing ‘Naads money’, more seedlings …is basically more of the same, thus consigning agriculture to basic subsistence.
What was conspicuously absent was the four (or is it six?) cow per family programme that President Museveni talked about a few years back, as a component of his Ideal Family Enterprise Model.
Mr Amama Mbabazi didn’t fare any better. Among the pillars of his advanced sub-county model is the ‘store’ at the sub-county. Is storage really a problem in commercial agriculture? Would farmers in Kamwenge growing maize under contract terms with Proctor&Gamble for cornflakes need a store at the sub-county?
The garnishing with the Maputo Declaration (now overtaken by Malabo) is but the standard high-sounding conference talk, discussing famine over steak. The whole thing actually is a replica of a social enterprise programme, with the plethora of ‘village associations’ that are now a common feature of the various social enterprise initiatives across Uganda.
A social enterprise is a third generation ‘business’, which in effect is the implementation of the second P (people) and the third P (planet) of a triple-bottom-line commercial enterprise. The key determinant pillar is the first P (profits) which supports the other Ps.
Dr Kizza Besigye talks of increasing agricultural funding…mechanisation…, the very same rhetoric typical of lamentation workshops, seminars, and pre-budget advocacy campaigns.
As we have argued earlier, the problem of Uganda’s agriculture is not financing per se. It is the ‘Blind Men -and-the-Elephant’ perception that we have about the sector.
Perhaps it is Gen Benon Biraaro’s LIFT concept that can lead us out of this rat-race. Lift is an acronym for Local Investment for Transformation.
It is premised on the power of numbers, where small contributions from large numbers make a great impact.
Agriculture is among the sectors to drive this transformation
Now that it is back to work, let’s get the facts and realities right.
It is agri-driven industrial development that will transform Uganda. We, therefore, need to focus on agri-industrial villages and conurbations, where the sector is both a source of raw materials and a catalyst for other industries
. A typical village farmer earning a minimum of Shs2 million per month, will be the effective demand that will trigger manufacturing of hitherto luxurious, aspirational goods and services.
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