05 Dec 2022

The youth have been advised to group themselves to realise better results in potato farming.

The advice was issued by  Francistown Deputy Mayor and Councillor for Itekeng Ward, Mr Lesego Kwambala at the beginning of a week-long potato bag farming training in Francistown.

Cllr Kwambala said working individually had led to failure and collapse of many projects.

“As youth, we have failed and if we cannot admit that we have failed, nothing will be achieved,” he said, urging them to form clusters and work together as a team for positive results.

He also urged the youth to come up with projects to better their lives and employ other youth.

He said after ensuring that the potato project was doing well, they could come up with other sustainable projects to augment it as part of value chain development.

The deputy mayor said the youth had the brains and hands to make things happen and help the country realise food security.

Resilience is important, he said, adding that although challenges were always there, they should not be discouraged but do all to ensure the project was a success for people from all corners of the country to come and benchmark in Francistown.

Founder and executive president of Farmer’s Pride International Investments Mr Elfas Zadzagomo urged the youth to have a mindset of a farmer and stay in farms, adding that farm products needed to be given the utmost attention.

He said urban farming could create employment, support social movements, build the community and bring development.

Mr Zadzagomo also encouraged the youth to venture into cluster farming, saying it used less resources, including land, while its rewards were huge.

He further advised the youth to go into food processing, sell products and their by-products.

He noted that moringa farming was valuable as it could be harvested for more than 62 years.

He said the plant  had multiple uses such as water purification,

Ministry of Youth, Sport and Culture Coordinator, Ms Tiny Tamasiga-Gontse observed that there were programmes to empower the youth and encouraged them to take advantage of available resources and programmes to produce food to feed the country and the SADC region. ENDS