29 Nov 2022

The bull donation  initiative is geared towards revolutionising Botswana's cattle-rearing landscape.

President Dr Mokgweetsi Masisi said this at Palapye’s Dikabeya lands yesterday stressing that the initiative carried immense potential to improve the fortunes of both individual farmers and the nation as a collective.

Gifting 58-year-old Mr Selemogo Mokgosi with a Bonsmara bull worth approximately P250 000, the President called on Batswana to fully embrace the initiative as well as to exploit to the fullest its job creation and wealth-generation potential.

"This programme has great wealth-generation and job creation potential. For this reason government will do its absolute best to ensure its success. We will therefore give farmers all the support they will need, including availing to them short courses to better equip them for their farming endeavours," he said.

Encouraging farmers to take local cattle breeds more seriously, Dr Masisi said he looked forward to one day donating Tswana and Musi bulls.

That would bear testimony to the nation having fully embraced their own, he said.

On the parallel small-stock initiative, he implored farmers to move towards commercial exploitation of the sector.

With government having secured external markets, Dr Masisi said, Batswana should rise to the occasion by viewing goats and sheep beyond just subsistence farming purposes.

"We have a problem of predators that we need to address.  ...government will help ensure that they (predators) do not reverse the gains that are being made," he said further assuring farmers that government would support them to protect their livestock from animals of prey.

Minister of Agriculture, Mr Fidelis Molao told Mr Mokgosi that with the gift, the world now lay at his feet.

Describing it as an avenue for endless opportunities, the minister encouraged the beneficiary to use available programmes such as artificial insemination to unlock the bull’s full potential through the sale of semen.

District agricultural coordinator, Mr Obert Mabutha said Mr Mokgosi started keeping cattle in the 1980s and that he had persevered through many challenges including a drought which almost wiped out his entire herd.

Mr Mokgosi expressed elation at being one of the initiative’s beneficiaries.ENDS