27 Apr 2017

The agricultural sector has the potential to ensure food security for the nation as well as bring high profits for farmers.
Officiating at this year’s annual Letsema event at Takatokwane on April 27, the Vice President Mr Mokgweetsi Masisi said it was therefore important that Batswana take the sector seriously and adjust their mind-set to the current times and challenges.

He said one way of achieving such was to adapt to new strategies such as dryland farming as practiced by dry countries such as Israel, rather than to only await the rainy season.
“The current practice where farmers only plough during the rainy season is not helping the sector because it means most of the year the land just lies unutilised,” he said.

Mr Masisi also said that Batswana should desist from the practice of only engaging seriously in agriculture when they reach retirement age.
“One way of ensure the future of the sector is to make it appealing to the youth, and I would therefore urge parents to ensure that cattle posts and lands are attractive to the youth by availing amenities such as electricity and proper structures,” he said.

He also said that in future government would require the amount of produce from farmers rather than the current practice where only the ploughed hectarage was measured.
Mr Masisi also urged farmers to take proper care of land and the environment as a way of ensuring that agricultural products feed the nation.

He said ‘land is a stagnant commodity that has to cater for an ever increasing population, and therefore it is vital that the little that is available is kept pure.’
“We are lucky that our cattle graze pure grass and drink pure water that are free from contaminants, and we should therefore consider ourselves lucky compared to other countries. We have to therefore ensure that the environment if kept pure by constructing toilets at cattle posts to keep our beef high quality,” he said.

Lands and cattle posts are the private sector of the agricultural sector and therefore it is important to develop them, he said.“In the last session of Parliament, we passed two bills that are vital to the development of agriculture being the Tribal Land Bill and the Deeds Registry Bill which will recognise the value of agricultural land such that it can be used as commodities to seek financial assistance,” he said.

For his part, the Assistant Minister of Agricultural Development and Food Security, Mr Kgotla Autlwetse said that the country’s import bill rose from P4.9 billion in 2010 to P7.4 billion last year, something he said was disturbing as it depicted exportation of jobs mainly to South Africa.
He said that ‘agriculture is the largest employment creator in the country whose value, when tapped, has the potential to positively impact on households of many people especially the rural communities.’

“I therefore challenge the private sector to take the lead in the agricultural value chains of production, processing, marketing and distribution to ensure a food secure Botswana in line with the Vision 2036 aspiration,” he said.
In his closing remarks, the Member of Parliament for Takatokwane, Mr Ngaka Ngaka complained of the high shortage of agricultural officials across the country, saying that this frustrates efforts to uplift the sector.

Mr Ngaka also said that even where the officers are available, they normally cover a large area which creates a challenge of too much workload, and that in most instances the officers are more general in their duties rather than being specialists.
He also hailed the event as it gives farmers a platform to engage and learn from each other.ENDS