14 Jul 2022

As Botswana joins the international community in effort to rebuild economies and livelihoods in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, the government’s Reset Agenda is an important step to assist the country build back better, President Dr Mokgweetsi Masisi has said. 

Delivering the keynote address to the High Level Political Forum of the United Nations (UN) Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) at the UN headquarters here yesterday, President Masisi said his government had put in place a number of interventions to revive the country’s economic fortunes. 

He told the audience, which included United Nations Secretary General António Guterres, several heads of state, and over a hundred cabinet ministers, lawmakers and delegates from across the world that the stance assumed by his government was that recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic should reflect and stimulate change. Therefore, the Government of Botswana had put in place new reset priorities in response to the pandemic’s devastating socio-economic effects. 

“Through our Reset Agenda we are transforming how we do things in order to build back better and we are reforming our public service to ensure effective implementation of the Government policies, projects and programmes. 

We are accelerating digitisation in the delivery of services by the Government and creating enabling conditions for the active involvement of the private sector and society in the uptake of digital technologies,” President Masisi said. 

He added that through the Reset Agenda government was pursuing a digitilisation programme to improve the delivery of services to the public by both government and the private sector, adding that in order to fasttrack growth, Botswana sought to also unlock economic value chains. 

“We are engaged in value chain development to unlock more value in the key sectors of Botswana’s economy such as agriculture, tourism, mining, and education, through the innovation, creativity and employment of our people, especially our youth.

 We are also engaged in inspiring our people to own the Sustainable Development Goals and to embrace them in both disposition and action,” he said. 

Furthermore, the President said Botswana had as a response to the pandemic developed the Economic Recovery and Transformation Plan (ERTP) to support the restoration of economic activities and incomes, expand the productive capacity and facilitate economic growth and transformation as well as to build the resilience of the economy. 

“The ERTP complements other ongoing plans and programmes such as the National Social Protection COVID-19 Recovery Plan, aimed at delivering a seamless system of social welfare programmes …targeting the most-needy,” Dr Masisi said. 

Noting that the COVID-19 pandemic and thereafter the Russia-Ukraine conflict which had had an adverse effect on global food and fuel prices, had negatively affected developing economies, Dr Masisi urged global stakeholders to mobilise financing, strengthen institutions and enhance national implementation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030. 

He called for “more ambitious, decisive, urgent action, and multi-stakeholder partnerships towards SDG implementable solutions. BOPA