01 Feb 2021

 The outbreak of COVID-19 has had a major impact on the implementation of the 2020/21 budget and compelled government to adjust spending plans and re-think priorities going forward.

Presenting the 2021/22 budget proposal, Minister of Finance and Economic  Development, Dr Thapelo Matsheka  said despite  the  difficulties  posed by the  pandemic, Information, Communication and Technology (ICT) infrastructure had been expanded with an additional 2 202 fibre-to-the-premises  connections achieved nation wide, bringing the total number  of connections to 5 953.

 He said there had also been a  substantial reduction in the price  of mobile broadband in 2020 as  operators reduced mobile broadband prices by 55 per cent and increased volumes of data  bundles by up to 200 per cent.

 The reduction, he said, had  made Botswana  one  of the most competitive countries  in Africa in terms of mobile data  pricing.

 Dr Matsheka noted that government had completed some key transmission and distribution infrastructure projects, which included the extension of the  high voltage  transmission grid to the north west part  of the country  in order to ensure reliability in power supply.

 He said the north west region project would unlock mining investments that had been suppressed due to lack of access to grid power in addition to reduce dependency on power imports.

He stated that the Morupule B power plant was currently undergoing comprehensive remedial works, which were scheduled for completion by 2023, adding that the first remedial work would be  completed and commissioned by June 2021.

With regard to the agricultural sector, Dr Matsheka highlighted that government  continued to finance various  activities  and programmes. However, he said high levels of agricultural spending had not yet yielded the  anticipated results.

He added that there was an ongoing review and evaluation of agricultural subsidy schemes such as ISPAAD and LIMID.

Furthermore, Dr Matsheka said P1.3  billion was  approved in the supplementary budget for the Industry Support Facility (ISF), which provided soft loans for existing businesses across the economy. He noted that the loans were administered  through the Citizen Entrepreneurial  Development Agency (CEDA), National Development Bank (NDB)  and  Botswana Development Cooperation (BDC).

 He said of the total, P900 million was provided for general industry while there were  dedicated  sums of P200 million for tourism enterprises and P100 million for agricultural enterprises.

 An additional P100 million, he said, had been made available to provide small grants to informal sector and micro enterprises registered with the Local Enterprise  Authority (LEA). ENDS