21 Mar 2016

Batswana have been challenged to be innovative in order to benefit from the Economic Stimulus Programme (ESP) as well as to exploit opportunities to help grow the economy.

Speaking at an ESP seminar for district development committee and the business community in Kanye, the programme’s coordinator, Ms Goitsemang Morekisi said the government has availed funding nationwide for the 2016/17 financial year for the Economic Stimulus Programme to invigorate the country’s economy to improve the standard and quality of life for Batswana. 

She said diamonds were injecting the largest revenue into government coffers prior to economic melt-down that hit the entire world.

She said as a result of the economic melt-down diamond sales went down forcing government to come up with interventions to ensure the economy does not sink below its trend path thus giving birth to the Economic Stimulus Programme.

Ms Morekisi said the government had to focus on sectors that had potential to catapult the economy to another level and accelerate job creation to better the lives of Batswana.

Therefore, targeted sectors include agricultural production, tourism development, Economic Diversification Drive, manufacturing industry, buildings and road construction as well as maintenance, re-skilling of youth and the establishment of Special Economic Zones.

She said to ensure that the government provides quality teaching environment and overcoming the backlog of maintenance in schools; new education amenities would be constructed as well as upgrading and providing maintenance works on existing ones on an accelerated basis.

Ms Morekisi said through the programme government would construct teachers and nurses houses as well as health facilities and their upgrading.

She said through ESP the government would decongest traffic along the A1 highway through the construction of additional feed roads and bypasses to expedite service delivery.

She said the economy would achieve significant growth through provision of infrastructure in production areas more especially power, water and road infrastructure.

She noted that ESP presents business opportunities through accelerated land servicing of industrial, commercial and residential plots as well as identification of land banks for ease of allocation to different economic activities.

She said people could form marketing companies that would specialise in promoting and selling the country’s flora and fauna as well as sites of historical significance.

She implored the business community to maintain a harmonious working relationship with the government to help develop Botswana above a middle-income status to another level as leaving the burden on the former alone may prove difficult.

Ms Morekisi said ESP management tried as much as possible to remove stumbling blocks that may hinder efficient and effective full delivery of the project.

She said the programme presents a golden opportunity for Batswana to turn-around the economy and challenged the business community to improve their workmanship to ensure the country benefits from services and commodities provided. Ends