09 Sep 2020

Ngamiland is reported to be one of the poorest districts in Botswana despite its wealth of the natural resources.

Many households in the district are reported to be living below the poverty datum line, despite efforts by the government to introduce brilliant initiatives geared towards improving the livelihoods of the communities at large.

To augment government efforts, one expert, Professor Toyin Kolawole from Okavango Research Institute (ORI) conducted research to provide a roadmap on how to address poverty issues in the Okavango and other rural communities in Botswana.

Prof. Kolawole is a rural development expert and in his findings to outline pathways on how to achieve poverty alleviation, he indicated that integrated rural development approach was key, stating that there was need to embrace a holistic, instead of a sectoral approach to rural development.

He spoke against focusing on the transformation of rural communities through piecemeal or disaggregated efforts of ministries, calling for it to be effectively synchronised.

Prof. Kolawole called for the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development to align its efforts with those of other ministries to develop an integrated and holistic plan for the development of rural communities.

He also underscored the need for guided deregulation of natural resources management, saying communities situated within and around the Okavango Delta must be regarded as true custodians of natural resources within their environment and be given the platform to adequately partner with the government in their adaptive co-management.

He said harvesting of natural resources such as veldt products, fish, water lily, medicinal plants, and other products needed to be locally regulated, in conjunction with relevant government agencies and departments as in the case of management oriented monitoring system (MOMS) under the Community Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM) initiative.

Prof. Kolawole stressed the need to refocus on CBNRM, which solely depend on the ‘reluctant’ joint venture partners, to enhance the local-level  development of entrepreneurial skills in tourism business.

Institutions such as Citizen entrepreneurial Development Agency (CEDA) and Local Enterprise Authority (LEA), he said could work together in ensuring local personnel skill development among community based organisations (CBOs) in relation to their tourism business activities.That, he believed would minimise failures of CBOs to effectively gain business astuteness and independence over the years.

Prof. Kolawole also called for mechanisms and frameworks that encouraged better accountability to assist in changing the face of CBNRM operations throughout the delta and elsewhere.  

He further called for innovative micro-business financing, stating that the engine of rural development was empowerment.

He said achieving context-specific, profit-maximising and cost-minimising rural business ventures could be enhanced through public-private partnerships (PPPs).Furthermore, he revealed that institutions such CEDA and LEA in conjunction with the North West District Council, could form a partnership with international financial institutions such as the World Bank to establish a specialised bank with a view to strengthen the financial capital outlays for prospective rural entrepreneurs through provision of loan facilities.

Prof. Kolawole pointed out that those who exhibited business astuteness like small business groups or individuals could benefit directly from the proposed scheme.

Developing astute rural entrepreneurs would be a radical departure from the Ipelegeng approach, which by design, is a stopgap measure to unemployment and does not necessarily encourage the development of people’s full potential.In real terms, he said the Ipelegeng approach provided fertile ground for the entrenchment of disguised unemployment at the grassroots level.

He also sugested establishing farm settlements as another pathway to address poverty, noting that farmers with same interests could be clustered to jointly grow agricultural produce in the spirit of cooperative.

Identifying suitable agricultural lands and developing farm settlements around them, he said may be a plausible strategy for growing employment and lifting people out of abject or extreme poverty. ENDS