The Soul of Corruption fight in Uganda: A balanced campaign for laws and morals is Key

Instead of reaching out to each other, we are stealing from each other. What a paradox! What is happening to value systems of this great land? On Monday 3^rd December 2012, The New Vision cover page headlines can shock a visitor to death, but are only telling for a resident –for corruption stories are sadly becoming a way of life in this Country. These headlines/subhead lines were on a single newspaper cover page, i.e.  (1) Germany cuts aid over corruption (2) OPM scam: Police opens 72 case files (3) Over 4 billion lost in Lira district Council (4) Billions from Global Fund vanish again. Perhaps, the only fine orange among the rotten apples was the fifth sub-headline; Uganda named tour paradise by experts.  

Folks, it’s now clear an iron curtain of corruption has descended across our country?  Indeed most sectors of life are affected- be it church, homes, schools, sports clubs, government offices, private offices, gardens etc. For example, farmers are reportedly conniving with extension workers to inflate input prices, some local councils and community leaders are taking bribes to make unfair decisions in village courts, police constables are reported receiving ‘facilitation’  to intervene on behalf of cunning village landed gentry to cheat peasants, teachers  are  riding bodabodas  for quick buck and receiving salaries (from tax payers)while our children are receiving no lessons, milk vendors are powering water in milk to cheat consumers,  traders are  tampering with weighing scales and cheating farmers, politicians are buying votes , business men are cheating government taxes etc – this trend may not be  in the headlines –but it is  sadly entrenched.    Will a compendium of anti-corruption laws and legislations stop this anarchy?  As a Country- we need a renewal and a return to our ancestral values that define us a people that lived by code of respect, fairness, community and honesty. All leaders and parents of this Country must engage in preaching and stop pointing fingers- because, givers and receivers of bribes are in summery all criminals.  I hope this will not be dismissed by sceptics and law puritans as moralising the fight against corruption.

My hunch tells me we have focused more on putting in place hardware administrative, legislative and judicial systems while relegating software incentives that entrench powerful value systems and social sanctions in our country.  The NRM government has worked to strengthen investigative organs that deal with corruption. For example, the government reformed the office of the Auditor General (AG) and Director of Public prosecutions (DPP) from mere departments to substantive and independent institutions.  The Parliamentary Accounts Committee (PAC) has powers of high court and is visibly interrogative and very much on the scene in the corruption fight.  The anti- Corruption Court is in place. The civil society is also involved in a bevy of actions aimed at visualizing corruption for masses. For instance the name and shame book by the Anti-Corruption Coalition and the latest push in form protests codenamed ‘black Monday’ – are highlighting citizens’ rage at this rampant theft. Debates in mainstream media and social media are hot and sometimes toxic. Even religious leaders have pitched prayers and led missions to ask the Almighty to bless this land and rid it of the sin of corruption. But the net result of these genuine efforts has been more exposure of corruption scandals as opposed to reducing and finishing it off. By exposing these corruption scandals, state agencies must be applauded and encouraged rather than the spurious demonization that has been going on.   Yes, we pay taxes to government to do a good job. And when they do it right, we should pat them on the back. But exposure of corruption is only good but not good enough.  We must find ways to stop it.

A sustainable solution to corruption lies in return to a robust struggle for revival and entrenchment of values of community and citizenship.   Especially so with young people in our schools, clubs and everywhere. They need to learn that the world must be shared and every one must have an opportunity. That to own twenty houses you can’t sleep in at once and four cars you can’t drive at once is meaningless and backward.  Parents must live by example- we must for instance go to our kids’ schools and request to speak to children classes about the subject of values like morality and community. If we don’t live by example and preach our historic values- society is gone! Not even the fiercest of laws and prison sentences will avert this dangerous trend. Does this sound simplistic?  No. It’s the only credible journey we must start.

Nelson Mandela, in his latest 2011 book – Conversations With My Self; tells a compelling story about real progress. He counsels that “.... In judging our progress as individuals, we tend concentrate on external factors such as one’s social position, influence and popularity, wealth and standard of education. These are of course important in measuring one’s success in material matters and it is perfectly understandable if many people exert themselves mainly to achieve all these. But internal factors may be even more crucial in assessing ones development as a human being. Honesty, sincerity, simplicity, humility, pure generosity, absence of vanity, readiness to serve others – qualities which are within reach of every soul – are the foundations of one’s spiritual life. Development in matters of this nature is inconceivable without serious introspection, without knowing yourself, your weaknesses and mistakes....never forget that a saint is a sinner who keeps on trying”

The foregoing gospel according to Mr. Mandela is important. Interpreted seriously, it summons our courage as a country to engage in serious introspection. He reminds us that those internal factors like honesty and readiness to serve others are the most important and within our reach. Aren’t    those we need to overcome corruption?  Can we defeat the reigning dominant psychology that is bent on material factors that Mr. Mandela talks about?  Can we rally to the principle of common citizenship that Winston Churchill talked about on 5^th March 1946?

Morrison Rwakakamba

mrwakakamba@gmail.com

Musisi, Banks wrong to peg collateral security on Youth Funds

On Saturday24th November, The Saturday Vision published an interview with Kampala Executive Director Jennifer Musisi. What was compelling for me was her response on the question of Youth Fund she recently suspended. She said beneficiaries must be ready to stake collateral security before they can access the money and now through a commercial bank- she argued thus, “...not even your father can give you money without security”- further stamping the convenient pre-condition of collateral security for access to credit finance. Indeed banks in Uganda have demonstrated high-level timidity when it comes to youth funds- they too see collateral security as a central requirement. They don’t want to lose money in risky ventures when there are opportunities like mortgage finance where they continue to make supernormal profits.

 I partly understand their fears- especially where most prospective borrowers have no basic records- like clear identifications, permanent places of abode and workplaces –even job security. But are there no other ways of dealing with this? Because in practical and real economics of credit finance- collateral security is not the most important requirement. What progressive credit entrepreneurs look for is the cash flow and credit history of real and prospective applicants. Partly because of inherent uncertainties in Uganda’s financial environment, banks seek to hedge their risks on movable and immovable collateral. What is making matters worse is also limited financial literacy and backbreaking interest rates that are over and above East African regional   average of 13%. 

Most of these conditional realities make un-propertied youth less attractive for lending institutions. This is why government set up a youth fund to circumvent most of these inhibitions to financial access by youth. So why is Jennifer Musisi taking this money back to the banks? Why is she and KCCA not piggybacking known methods of social collateral and venture capital financing approaches to transform this fund? Are there no lessons of success since this fund was set up two years ago? Will the youth fund provide a silver bullet for unemployment/underemployment in Uganda? I wish to illuminate two strategies that can unlock this dilemma;-

A: The social collateral model

Social collateral works in a group system of people who share similar social and community ties, business vision, enterprise and values – with trust as the anchor which lubricates the social system. What actually links this group is a combination of social and economic pursuits. Such could be youth or women groups in Nakasero and Kisekka markets. They could also be highly informal Eshabwee or Maleewa traders with local expertise in these indigenous gastronomy delicacies. They even could be a group with innate expertise in ensenene business. They could be a group of boda boda riders, young graduates doing crafts, young people fabricating metals in Katwe etc. These groups usually have a firm regime of unwritten code and heavy social sanctions on wayward members. If such groups are targeted with financing, liability will be shared, risk spread and members will compel their peers to pay back. No beneficiary would likely default at the expense of losing group trust. Social accountably in such groups is entrenched. With this approach, community ties matter more than a bunch of cold bank calculations. Borrowers under this system don’t pay the common 5% application fee and have a monthly interest rate of 2%, and they can earn discounts for paying off their loans early. This system is working for many quiet informal savings and lending groups in Uganda and formal groups in India and Bangladesh. Can it work for our Kampala youth? Yes, if robust due diligence, quick anthropological inquiries and careful selection of groups is worked out. Are the managers of youth fund ready for this? Can the KCCA study this option?

B: How about the Venture Capital Fund?

Venture funds are meant to capitalize and commercialize agile ideas that would rather be stalled because of lack of financing. Venture capital funds are also created to circumvent strict conditions that strain access to capital necessary to finance entrepreneurs with high potential jobs creating ideas. We must note that, these funds don’t have to necessarily go to the youth- but rather to entrepreneurs (women, men, young, middle aged, old etc) with an idea that can create meaningful jobs for citizenry. A youth is concerned about finding a job- no matter who created that job- that’s a detail. Therefore, venture funds can never be about these guidelines we have seen around – like having a senior four certificate or an enterprise that employs four people, collateral security etc! Instead the aim of venture funds/capital   is to go around these conditions. Such a venture fund can be run by private sector organisations, trusts, foundations, universities, governments etc.

 For example, the Silicon Valley venture capital and angel investors’ schemes were started by Stanford University in California USA. Now Silicon Valley is synonymous with innovation. It is the birthplace of Apple, Google and eBay, among other tech giants. These innovations giants- have created millions of jobs, not just in the United States, but across the world.  What is Makerere University doing to spur space and investment for innovations? Makerere Katanga Valley which used to be owned by the University is now a chaotic real-estate enclave!  The electronic vehicle, Kiira EV, manufactured by students of the College of Engineering, Design, Art and Technology at Makerere provided the Country an opportunity to test venture capital/financing model. But why isn’t the private sector pitching in money to commercialize production of electrical cars /Kiira EV brand for markets across Eastern Africa? Did Makerere University move forward to put this to test or they want to put the vehicle in the museum?   Can the new Vice Chancellor pitch for us something inspiring and truly imaginative?

You see the President on the advice of ministry of Finance officials accepted this youth fund proposal because it is key to mitigating surging unemployment and underemployment rates across the Country. We must not frustrate the President’s efforts by pandering to old and self preserving processes. There are great youth and their groups out there who can be helped by this opportunity. The options of social collateral and venture capital financing should be fully studied and deployed. Let’s not wait for unemployment explosion that will be impossible to manage.

Morrison Rwakakamba

Chief Executive Officer

Agency for Transformation (AfT)

agencyft@hotmail.com

www.aft-u.org

Aft is a think and do tank based in Uganda

With Technology and Elite capture - Are Cooperatives Relevant today?

With over 10,400,000 citizens  connected to mobile phones (according to International Communication Union) over 5,000,000 browsing internet daily and millions tuning into more than 228 fm radio stations  broadcasting in local languages – Do we still need the kind of cooperatives that operated in 1970’s and 1980s to connect farmers and small businesses to markets? Calls for revival of Cooperatives are a hot and rehearsed issue, amongst, especially opposition politicians and operatives. Possibly bending a bit to pressure, government rebranded the Ministry to Trade Tourism and Industry to Ministry of Trade and Cooperatives! Alas- this Cooperative narrative needs to be re-imagined in current Uganda. We need to be talking about new ways of organizing and governing markets. If old cooperatives don’t change, what is left of them will soon disappear.

You see, Ugandans started organizing themselves into co-operatives in 1913. Co-operatives operated informally until 1946 when the first co-operative ordinance was enacted and this marked the birth of the co-operative department and the present co-operative movement. By the end of 1946 there were 75 organizations of a cooperative nature. Fifty (50)  of these were agriculture marketing societies, 8  were  shop keepers (supply) societies, 6 were consumer stores and the remainder were miscellaneous societies  such as fishermen (mainly for supply of nets), cattle and dairy societies and one thrift society. The period 1946 to 1970 saw a significant growth of the co-operative movement especially in the cotton and coffee sectors. In 1951, co-operatives handled 14,300 tons of cotton and coffee. Following the acquisition of two coffee curing works and ten ginneries in 1956, the total tonnage rose to 89,308 tons by 1960. In 1965, out of 437,923 bales of cotton produced in the country, co-operatives handled 267,420 bales (61%) while they also handled 40% of the Robusta coffee. At the centre of this progress, were producers/farmers and owners of small businesses themselves making decisions.

Fast-forward- to 1970s, a new crop of elites captured co-operatives and greatly mismanaged, interfered with, and alienated decision making from membership. Annual General Meetings lost meaning and interests of largely farmers were relegated. It is still the same story today. Look at the wars for supremacy and influence in Bugisu, Banyankore Kweteran, Nyakatozi cooperatives etc- elites and politicians are fighting to take charge and make quick gains – both material and political at the expense of membership. Now old cooperatives are moribund and farmers don’t trust them anymore.  Dealing with old cooperative mean increase in transaction costs that cut into profits of farmers. Most farmers are quitting old cooperatives and seeking new ways of organizing.

For example in Kasenda sub- county, Kabalore district, small-scale farmers have institutionalised informal collective marketing arrangements to increase their profits. When matooke is ready for harvest in the field, farmers, with their mobile phones, call relatives in Kampala and Fort Portal to check market prices. Trusted community informants circulate the information, and survey households’ expected harvest. Then they negotiate favourable large volumes and prices with buyers. The farmers bring their matooke to collection centres on designated days, where community representatives finalise negotiations and collect and distribute payments. This informal way of connecting means farmers in Kasende don’t have to pay bulking and marketing fees to the cooperative – they in the end get full market prices. Cooperatives that want to survive must understand such new realities.

Politicians and other leaders calling for revival, restoration etc of cooperatives must pause and reflect. Such narratives are stale and outdated. We should support old cooperatives if they are willing to re-invent themselves to new realities or rather support emerging new ways of organizing. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) seems to get the point. They now define ‘co-operatives’ very broadly: ‘any member-owned enterprise run on democratic principles…which can take other names and forms: producer organizations, self-help groups, unions and federations of producers…and [even] Chambers of agriculture’. …and ‘contract farming. Are Bugisu, Banyankole Kweterana, Nyakatozi etc in this new mode of thinking?

My fried Ethel Del Pozo Vergnes of International Institute for Environment and Environment (IIED) argues that “understanding and improving the conditions under which small-scale farmers make markets work for themselves, whether in formal or informal organizations, is what lets them play their role as economic actors…….It is time to understand where farmers really are rather than where we want them to be” I agree with her. Let’s keep this debate leaping skyward.

Morrison Rwakakamba

Chief Executive Officer

Agency for Transformation (AfT)

agencyft@hotmail.com

www.aft-u.org

Aft is a think and do tank based in Uganda

What is killing Uganda’s agricultural sector?

See Link- http://www.newvision.co.ug/news/636334-what-is-killing-uganda-s-agricultural-sector.html

Transforming Agriculture in Uganda- 9 points for action

See link-  http://pubs.iied.org/G03363.html

FAO- Global Forum on Food Security and Nutrition discussion. My response to the latest question.

Question: If you were designing an agricultural investment programme, what are the top 5 things you would do to maximize its impact on nutrition?

Response:

For effective investment, I would look at the following;

1.   For example, in 2008, Uganda crafted a Food and Nutrition Security policy that details practical interventions for arresting food insecurity, undernourishment and over nourishment. It will be interesting to audit the state of policy implementation. As far as I can recall, there was a clash of mandate on which ministry was to take lead in implementation- i.e. The Ministry of Health or The Ministry of Agriculture Animal Industry and Fisheries? Was it resolved? Is implementation process on rail? Are we achieving results?
2. The other aspect is about education and information on nutrition. Are households (rural, peri-urban and urban) exposed to ferment of information on nutrition? Take the example of Bushenyi district in western Uganda-  it is one of the highest milk producers in Uganda  with the highest level of undernourished children! Reason? All milk is sold out and less /none is left for children. Can we strike a balance between what goes to the market and what is served on the table.
3.  Related to the above- with information and little bit of nudging from local authorities- surely every household in Uganda- save for slum-urban dwellers can have a small kitchen/back yard garden of vegetables/ fruits etc. Its’ possible to have this culture here? Yes- it is possible if we invest in information and efficacy of local governments.
4. Uganda should put in place- a one milk cow for every household policy. Why?  One-Milk will be available for families.  Two- Manure (compost) to make other crops (variety) work. The contention is on the right breed and balancing inputs and outputs and context of a given household.
5.   Make fortified and drought resistant seeds accessible for areas facing undernourishment and stunted children in Uganda (drought prone and conflict areas).

Morrison Rwakakamba

Chief Executive Officer

Agency for Transformation (AfT)

mrwakakamba@gmail.com

http://www.aft-u.org/

http://www.rwakakamba.blogspot.com/

MUSEVENOMICS: Engaging Uganda's President Museveni on whether high commodity/food prices mean better income for farmers

Click this link- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OF-mcUS5D6k&feature=channel_video_title

Popular understanding as postulated by Ugandan President Museveni suggests that if the prices of commodity prices go up, farmers should benefit by way of higher income. Morrison Rwakakamba from Uganda, a practicing economist and an active member of the  Knowledge Programme on “Small Producers’ Agency in Globalised Markets” argues that while this might theoretically be true, the practice is a bit detached from the theory. He explains that certain structural factors inhibit the farmers from ‘harvesting’ the dividend of high commodity prices. He suggests that part of the solution could lie in the farmers’ exercising their collective agency to negotiate effectively with the middlemen and traders.

Investing back into the farm to raise its productivity and processing the raw material before selling could be another way to raise incomes of farmers, as per Morrison. President Museveni’s call to focus on the segment of population that is affected by rising commodity prices – read the middle class, is unsubstantiated by the amount the salaried groups spend for example on luxury goods.  On the contrary it would appear that the producers would be affected far more adversely by way of lower procurement prices and high cost of goods and services.  

The learning network members from various parts of Asia, Africa and Latin America are engaged in research which hopes to generate new insights related to the interactions between the small producers and the (changing) markets.

- Contribution from Hivos website - http://www.hivos.net/Hivos-Knowledge-Programme/Themes/Small-Producer-Agency/News/MUSEVENOMICS-analyzed

FOOD SECURITY IN UGANDA: MY CONVERSATION WITH VOICE OF AMERICA

Click on the Link- http://www.voanews.com/audio/Audio/9131.html

Morrison Rwakakamba
Chief Executive Officer
Agency for Transformation (AfT)
http://www.aft-u.org/

RE-INVENTING THE OFFICE OF INSPECTOR GENERAL OF GOVERNMENT (IGG) AS A CITIZEN INSTITUTION

When the Embassy of the Royal Kingdom of Netherlands called me on 5/12/11 to request that I meet up with the Netherlands deputy Ombudsman, Adriana Stehouwer, I knew that a chance to put agenda of citizens on top IGG’s  business had arrived. Yet I am also aware that enduring change in our institutions cannot be fully driven by outside partners but by citizens themselves. I asked that Adriana meets me at my office on 14/12/11. We held cordial discussions that gravitated on ways in which citizens can fully engage with the institution of the IGG. Our discussions summed around the following issues;

Citizen debates, discussions, blog dashboards, brethren sermons etc, in Uganda seem to illuminate IGG as an institution whose role is to investigate, arrest, prosecute and put corruption suspects behind bars. Yet a quick check at IGG website (http://www.igg.go.ug/), one notes that IGG is also mandated to create mass public awareness not only about what it does but also what citizens can do to promote transparency through reporting, speaking out, doing proactive citizen investigation, citizen journalism etc. One also notes that the office of IGG seem to be fossilized and out of touch with citizenry – at least from expressions of citizens. It is apparent that the institution needs to open up to citizen engagement and pursue innovations to reach to citizenry through a feed forward and feedback communication integrated system. Why is the IGG not doing this? Is the institution cash stressed? Is this enough excuse, or rather there could be other natural and cheaper ways of easily reaching out to citizens?

For example, the language of the IGG is largely legalistic and not liberated for citizens to engage with it fully. Most times, all you see are huge annual reports that are difficult to navigate- at least for millions of citizens.   Yet if the IGG democratized their information in formats that are simple and easy to read/digest– and also used unorthodox networks of change like mobile phones, facebook, faith networks etc to reach out to citizens, more debate and unfettered  interaction between the office of the IGG  and citizens would make it more effective and responsive to citizen interests. Data from International Communications Union shows that in Uganda, 10,400,000 citizens have mobile phone access, 3,200,000 are using internet and 228 radios are on air, localized and broadcasting in myriad local languages.  The inspectorate can harness the power of these communication technologies to create buzz around their work and garner citizen feedback and comment. This is how IGG will be a truly citizen institution. This is how IGG will enhance its legitimacy as a true servant of Ugandans- working with them to contain and eliminate corruption.

By engaging in the foregoing, the quality on now expanded services will deliver quality outcomes. Public monies will come under greater scrutiny, with citizens not merely participating in budget processes but also monitoring and tracking their money.

Morrison Rwakakamba

Chief Executive Officer

Agency for Transformation
http://www.aft-u.org/

Re-imagining agricultural and environmental policy  

Oil in Uganda: What does it mean for Agriculture sector?

The recent discoveries of oil and gas deposits in Uganda present new opportunities through access to energy and increased oil revenues that can be used to chart a sustainable growth path that does not only create economic growth but also results in economic development whereby growth is fairly well distributed to facilitate poverty reduction. However, these discoveries come in the midst of serious concerns and controversies that have characterized the empirical relationship between oil rents and development, particularly in the oil exporting African countries. The disappointing development performance of many resource rich economies has been a topical issue among policy makers, NGOs, civil society and academicians. Many countries have failed to leverage their natural resource wealth into strong states. For some of these countries, oil, gas, and mineral wealth have become associated with high poverty rates, weak state institutions, corruption, and conflict

One concern that has triggered a substantial amount of theoretical and empirical debate is the Dutch disease effect of natural resource abundance. This phenomenon describes the situation whereby the additional revenues from the natural resources put pressure on demand for domestic goods and services in a way that consequently raises the value of the local currency (real exchange rate appreciation) and makes tradable goods uncompetitive. This might stifle other sectors of the economy like agriculture and education.

The extractive industry has considerable impacts in our countries, not least on our economies. Its impacts are felt and seen at many levels including employment, government revenues, expropriation of populations, population displacement, health, the environment, education, culture, and life in general.

The case for “Dutch Disease” and Agriculture in Uganda is even more pronounced given that Uganda primarily depends on agriculture for survival. With over 80% of the population employed in agricultural and coffee,  until recently the major export commodity, a negative influence on agriculture due to oil would have dire consequences. The theory of Dutch disease is that an increase in revenues from oil will adversely affect the tradables (manufacturing and agriculture) of a nation’s economy by appreciating the local currency, which in turn makes manufacturing and agriculture less competitive.

High oil revenues raise exchange rates, promote an adverse balance of payments on the cost of imported goods when prices fall, boost wages for skilled labor – ultimately pricing them out of the international market - and reduce the incentive to risk investment in non-oil sectors. In short, it kills the competitiveness of all non-oil sectors, squeezing out vital sectors like agriculture and manufacturing, leaving oil as the only functioning revenue source. Just one example includes Gabon, which since initiating the export of oil has seen its agriculture sector collapse; it is now entirely dependent on imported food.

The environmental pollution caused by oil drilling also results in a destruction of livelihoods in local communities making it difficult for the present and future generations to make a living off of their land. Farming and fishing activities, the mainstay of these economies, literally grind to a halt with the exploration of oil.

Oil exploration and production entails acquiring land which ultimately requires eviction of people that were formerly in those areas. It becomes worse where the process entails construction of refineries and pipelines. The women of Ogoniland, Nigeria who earn their living as farmers can testify to the ways in which the execution of oil projects compromises their livelihoods. In late April 1993, for example, farmlands close to the Ogoni pipeline were bulldozed with no regard for the crop growing on the land.  The situation is no different in Cameroon where the construction of the Chad-Cameroon oil pipeline by ExxonMobil, Petronas and Chevron have had serious survival implications for the Bagyeli (UNCTAD 2007). This is because the pipeline project left a 30 meter wide gap through the forest, where the Bagyeli hunted, gathered and cultivated crops. The effect of this is the loss of land and access to resources upon which Bagyeli livelihoods have traditionally been based (Nelson 2002).

The effects of the “Dutch Disease” are not a foregone conclusion. With foresight and careful management of how the oil revenues get injected in the economy, this phenomenon can be avoided.

Since majority of Ugandans are employed in the agricultural sector, one would want to know what would happen if most of the oil resources were used to unleash the binding constraints to agricultural productivity. In this case, oil resources would be used to provide, for example, fertilizers, extension services or better technologies that would result into higher yields in the sector. A projection study done by researchers at the Makerere University based Economic Policy Research Center   shows that appropriate use of oil resources to increase productivity in the agricultural sector would mitigate the adverse Dutch disease effects associated with the oil resources. The overall growth rate would be higher than what it is today.  In relation to the exports, the researchers noted that they would be a lot higher than in the case where by the oil resources were not spent productively. Given that a large part of the manufacturing sector is agroprocessing, researchers further noted that the manufacturing sector would hardly be affected given its intermediary link with the more productive agricultural sector. The agro‐processing sector would also grow in line with other agricultural activities.

Interestingly, the same researchers found out that the argument that resources would be shifted to the non‐tradables like services if most oil revenues are invested in agriculture, would not hold in this case. Indeed, the growth rate of the services would be much more subdued. Given that the majority of the population which is poor is involved in agricultural activities, targeting the oil resources at the sector would also result into considerable reduction in poverty. The welfare of citizens increased through higher levels of consumption – and this is determined not only by what they produce themselves, but also by the additional consumption and investment that the oil revenue finances.

In a nutshell, the fears for an oil industry to subdue and suffocate the agricultural sector are founded. A deliberate effort must be made to ensure that a balanced macroeconomic fiscal regime is put in place to ensure that key sectors like manufacturing and Agricultural; are not outcompeted and made less competitive. At the community level, caution must be exercised to ensure livelihoods of communities displaced by oil extraction activities are compensated and at the national level, right and appropriate policy decisions must be taken to ensure the co-existence of agriculture and the oil industry.

Morrison Rwakakamba

Chief Executive Officer

Agency for Transformation

mrwakakamba@gmail.com

http://www.aft-u.org/

Re-imagining agricultural and environmental policy

2012/2013 Agriculture Budget: The challenge is to make little available money work for farmers

Roman author, lawyer, orator, & politician, Marcus Tullius Cicero 106 BC - 43 BC argued that “The National Budget must be balanced. The public debt must be reduced; Payments to foreign governments must be reduced, if the nation doesn't want to go bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance” The foregoing brings out two important lessons: a) that a National budget should focus on growing internal capability to generate local revenues to finance its own budget and thus reduce dependence on aid. Indeed, that we incurred $5.31 billion on importing goods and earned only $4.1billion from export of goods and services in the last financial year is a trend that we have to reverse as a country. b) That citizens should not expect government to provide everything but rather people should work to develop themselves and their country- a budget should not make people dependant on the state. A state is only a regulator and enabler. Will the 2012/2013 agriculture budget enable the sector to grow and gain competitiveness in the region? I will hereunder provide my thoughts on Hon. Maria Kiwanuka’s budget speech.

1. Allocation to the agriculture sector: A 150billion increment to sector allocation, i.e. from 434.1 billion last financial year to 585.3 billion this financial year is a positive move in a right direction. Considering the importance of the sector to food and nutrition security, creation of jobs and raw materials, agriculture should get even bigger share of the pie. But what should concern farmers and those that are concerned about them is the efficient utilisation of the allocated money to transform lives of farmers and country. Therefore, farmer groups, community leaders and barazas, should develop mechanisms to follow this money. At the National level, Uganda National Farmers Federation should coordinate budget implementation monitoring efforts. Farmers must organize to engage and turn budget in their favour.
2. Clear targets and outcome indicators should be contained in the budget speech. For example, National Agriculture Advisory Services (NAADS) got 52.9 billion; will this for example increase the percentage of farmer households that are visited by an extension worker from the current 14% to at least 30% come next financial year? And what will be the percentage of this on real agriculture productivity growth?  How about the allocation of 48.9billion to the National Agricultural Research Organisation (NARO)? will this allocation lead to development of for example coffee and banana wilt resistant varieties by next financial year- or a report on progress? Or what is the projected figure of farmers that will receive wilt free planting materials? The selection of flagship commodities like coffee, tea, maize, beans, market fruits, vegetables and fish is good for both export earnings and food and nutrition security- remember beans and posho have guaranteed food and nutrition security in most schools for many years. But what is our target tonnage for beans, maize, fish this financial year? Targets will be the only way we can follow and determine our performance come the reading of our next budget.

3. The power of leverage and smart budget applications. The budget can also be a powerful stimulator of innovations and investment from the private sector. For example, unlike the last financial year where hoes were prominent – this financial year, 500 million shillings have been provided for tractors. Indeed with increasing scarcity of labour resources in the rural, and the cost of opening up arable land for production are increasing at a geometric rate with the piece rate is averaging at 3500 shillings – this is a good move. These tractors, once used collectively will provide a great relief. But some interesting options to consider- If we offered a tax holiday incentive to a tractor assembling company and removed all taxes and duties on tractor spare parts, we could have a cartel of interested companies that will provide tractors to farmers and farmer groups across the country at affordable rates. The same would also work for irrigation. There are companies, for example Davis and Shirtliff that produce handy and intermediate irrigation equipment, can a tax incentive make their equipment affordable to many farmers? It is indeed viable. How about such companies working with Uganda Industrial Research Institute to spur innovations in intermediate and high end irrigation technologies?  

4. Allocation to Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA). UCDA has been doing a good job. They scientifically realized that the reason for slumping coffee productivity and plummeting exports was due to coffee wilt, old coffee trees (above 30 years and can’t be productive), harvesting of green unripe bellies and poor post harvest handling. UCDA has been on strong campaign- distributing clean planting materials and doing some progressive work on the other above challenges. UCDA should have been rewarded with a bigger pie within the agriculture sector budget- I hope they can mobilize money from other sources to keep the campaign and momentum going.

Conclusion;

We are reaching a time when agriculture sector cannot be ignored. Budget numbers alone will not wholly eliminate supply side and demand side constraints facing the agriculture sector. But rather integrity in delivery of agriculture services will be the anchor to unlock the sector code. This is a role we can all undertake in our communities, churches and other spaces. I agree with the point of view that community leaders and church leaders at the grass roots should get back to work and re-engage the work of monitoring service delivery and mobilizing people to work. By laws that stop people from alcohol consumption at 11 am at those village trading centres should be enforced. A mix of enforcement and the market should work as pull factors to transform the rural. Lipton, 2005, argues that there are virtually no examples of mass poverty reduction since 1700 that did not start with sharp rises in employment and self employment income due to higher productivity in small scale family farms. This remains true for Uganda.

Morrison Rwakakamba

Chief Executive Officer

Agency for Transformation

mrwakakamba@gmail.com

http://www.aft-u.org/

Re-imagining agricultural and environmental policy

Open Government: Why Citizens Should Monitor Uganda’s Policy Commitments

On 20^th September in New York President Barack Obama launched the Open Government Partnership (OGP, see www.opengovpartnership.org), a powerful, new effort that seeks to make governments more open to their citizens. Not anyone can join; eligible countries need to meet a minimum set of transparency criteria. In Africa only six countries qualified; of which five (South Africa, Tanzania, Kenya, Liberia and Ghana) have joined the partnership. The eligible country that did not join? Uganda.

One wonders why. At the pre-launch meeting of the partnership in July, Uganda was represented by no less than its Minister of Finance, Planning and Economic Development (MFPED), Hon. Maria Kiwanuka. So what happened? Could it be that the government was not able to organize itself around the tight OGP deadline? Or does it have a more basic, philosophical objection to the tenets of the OGP, with openness?

In his closing remarks at the OGP launch, President Obama emphasized: “the more open we are, the more willing we are to hear constructive criticism, the more effective we can be. And ultimately, governments are here to serve the people, not to serve those in power.” Earlier, at the same occasion, Twaweza Head Rakesh Rajani stated: ‘Perhaps the most important reason we need open government … is because we acutely need to build trust. Openness can bring governments and citizens together, cultivate shared understandings, and help solve our practical problems’. 

To be fair, Uganda has committed to be open in other ways. Of the East African countries, Uganda is the one that has a freedom of information law, and a whole slew of ethics laws.

More specifically, in her June 15 2011, letter of Intent and Memorandum of Economic and Financial Policies to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Minister Kiwanuka made a whole set of promises to be open. Studying the letter and its annexes, one notes government’s mindfulness of Uganda’s post election fragile economy and its optimism on what the country’s economic future holds. Hon. Kiwanuka made several policy reform commitments, each pegged with deadlines. I was attracted by this businesslike approach of clear targets and timelines. These concrete, measureable commitments also make it easy for citizens to monitor government progress.

So how well does Uganda fare? Let’s review a few of the commitments to the IMF

First, to enforce discipline in issuance of  tax exemptions, Uganda has promised that by September 30, 2011  government will begin to gazette and publish on the internet the names of beneficiaries (whether individual or corporation) of all tax expenditures (criteria for tax exemptions, tax holidays and tax rebates). I have checked websites of MOFPED, Uganda Revenue Authority (URA), Bank of Uganda and Uganda Investment Authority (UIA), but the promised published list is nowhere to be found. Secrecy 1, Openness 0.

Second, the Uganda government commits to budgetary discipline and promoting fiscal transparency over treatment of unspent budgetary funds.  Specifically, the government committed to publish balances on all accounts in Bank of Uganda and commercial banks by July 31, 2011 and October 30, 2011 respectively. My protracted inquiry and check on this commitment also reveal this target has not been achieved. Secrecy 2, Openness 0.

Third, in order to strengthen revenue collection and combat money laundering and financial terrorism, the government committed to issue four million identity cards to Ugandans by June 30, 2012. Eight months remain. Citizens need to watch the score.

Fourth, the letter to IMF, beyond disclosure requirements, sets goals for economic performance. Perhaps the most ambitious one is to contain core inflation below 5% in the 2011/2012 financial year. The present reality points in the opposite direction. In spite of efforts by Bank of Uganda (BoU) to tighten monetary policy, consumer price index inflation accelerated from 5 per cent in January 2011 to 28.3 per cent in September 2011, pushing millions of families to hustling and subsistence livelihoods. Is Central Bank getting it right? Or is it afraid of accepting failure?  Could open government, admitting failure and inviting alternative ideas to get the country out of this bleak economic outlook, help?

Fifth, the specter of corruption and misuse of public funds haunts every corner of the fiscal landscape in Uganda. Here transparency can help curtail the worst abuses. Are the oil contracts and the projected oil revenues going to be made public? Will their management, much like Norway’s oil fund for example, be managed with a high degree of public transparency? At the local level, can the ordinary citizen know of and follow every shilling spent for education, health and roads?

Will Uganda join the Open Government Partnership in the next round and commit to strengthening transparency? Will the above mentioned and other commitments in Hon. Kiwanuka’s letter to the IMF (see http://www.imf.org/external/np/loi/2011/uga/061511.pdf) be honored? Indeed, are Ugandan citizens monitoring these commitments? For in the end what matters more is not the commitments in New York or in letters to international institutions, but the practice on the ground, and what is open to the citizens of Uganda. And that may depend less on the munificence of Presidents and Ministers, and more on the tenacity of citizens.

Morrison Rwakakamba

Chief Executive Officer

Agency for Transformation

mrwakakamba@gmail.com

http://www.aft-u.org/

Re-imagining agricultural and environmental policy

Can we create jobs? Budget Priorities and Job creation in a competitive Regional Market

Uganda’s National Budget has been presented and explained as a statement of projected revenues and expenditure. The larger section of the citizenry understand it as a ritual of government to announce the budget every June of every year. As a young man in the early 90’s I used to see many people hurdled on radios at small trading centers listening to the budget speech. Delving deeper, their interest was and largely remains announcement of tax cuts on basic home use commodities like salt, Kerosine, soap, sugar, Kimbo (cooking oil) etc and tax cuts on tools and implements like hoes (jjembe) and pangas. For this is the true story of many Ugandans across the country. Citizens are exceedingly unaware of the role they can play in influencing budget allocations and monitoring budget implementation, yet citizens if informed and involved form the core of effective budget accountability.

What is now called the ‘budget circle consultative process’ a supposed democratic platform for citizen participation largely remains a ritual. We have participation power with out decision power. Well some private sector interests have been considered (especially manufacturing and services sectors) but how about farmers who have been crying for double digit allocation for the last 14 years! Farmers have been voicing this concern in these budget circle consultative processes; only to be slapped by 3% to 4% allocation, yet again! Even the Special support of Shillings 90 Billion, Agricultural Fund, that was provided to ensure that interest rates in the sector are not more than 10 % per annum did not impact the fortunes of farmers. There remains no transparency, no information on how this fund can be accessed. No clear and simple guidelines on how a farmer from Amudat district, Rukungiri, Kenjojo etc can access this money. All we hear is that the money was finished! Who took it? What was it used for? How many jobs were created?

Looking at the budget priorities memoranda from productive sector agencies and ministries of government, one important thing is amiss! jobs jobs. The country wants to see budget proposals from for example the  Ministry of Trade and Industry  that clearly state the money they need and how many jobs the Ministry will create and a projection of contribution to the GDP in a given year. Now what do we hear? we hear concerns about mismatch between budget allocations and actual release, we hear of failure by government departments and ministries to absorb  budgeted and released resources; What do we see? we see services budget for and approved not reaching the people! We see tertiary institutions churning out 300,000 graduates with only 40,000 jobs available! I can tell you, this is a crisis.

2.0       Talking Jobs: What is the place of Uganda’s private sector?

Uganda’s Private Sector is fragile, largely informal and dominated by Micro, Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (MSMEs). MSMEs employ approximately 1.5 million people equivalent to 90% of total non-farm private sector workers. Annual employment growth in the sector is about 20% per annum[1]. Most of the businesses are located in Kampala (45%) and Central Uganda (21%). The rest are distributed across the other regions as follows: Western Uganda: 14%, Eastern Uganda: 13%, and Northern Uganda: 7%.  Private sector businesses contribute 75% to national GDP. Agriculture, trade, construction and Manufacturing are the most important contributors to the national economy. The figure below shows GDP as a percentage share by economic activity;

Uganda a symetry of business start ups!

The private sector, (MSMEs)annual employment growth  is estimated 20 percenet per annum.  Yet the majority of the businesses (35 percent) are aged between 1 and 5 years and those that 25 years or more are only 4 percent. It is clear from these figures that the failure rate in business startups is high. The high mortality rate for business start-ups is explained by the burdensome regulatory environment and the rising cost of doing business on account of inadequate infrastructure, costly and unreliable electricity, rising cost of fuel, and the high cost of business finance. Other factors include corruption, bureaucracy and capacity constraints in the various public institutions[2]

Uganda a graveyard of nimble entreprenuerial ideas.

Yet in spite of businesses to failure to survive, Ugandans continue to come up with ideas. For example, over 9000 new firms are registered each year[3]. Though still a small number, this is good news, it shows the attitude for doing business, for formalizing business is taking shape. It also means survival of these firms translates into jobs. What should vastly concern us are the reasons why most of these registered start-ups never reach their 5^th birthday? The death of business start ups mean death of jobs. How can these ideas be supported? How can the budget support businesses to not only to survive but to expand and transform? I therefore wish to contribute 5 points;

Though FAQ (Kase) prices have now increased to UGSHS 4500 a kilo at the farm gate in some places, we still largely export graded coffee. We export massive jobs at the level of roasting, grinding coffee, packing coffee etc. What should be noted is where as a farmer makes UGSHS 4500 from a kilo of FAQ coffee, a retailer makes UGSHS 320,000! This is the same with cotton, tea, fish, etc!  To create jobs, a special Value Addition Fund (delivered at an interest rate of 5%, grace period of over one year, with clear guidelines on how to be accessed) should be provided for in the next budget.

Fierce urgency to Harvest the demographic dividend. Uganda’s population is at 33 million. With 7 children per woman (average), Uganda’s population will be over 130 million in the next fifty years. What should concern us is the quality of the population. Is our population skilled,imaginative, agile, curious, entrepreneurial, self reliant and inspired? Or rather semi skilled, subsistence, surviving and thriving, nature based (chance based),welfarelist (waiting for handouts), laid back and cynical? Our people are the only enduring wealth that this country has. We must invest in them, leaders at all levels must inspire them in words and actions and align them to a common vision. I know that Enterprise Uganda is conducting entrepreneurship training, business advisory and counseling service, information, business planning, marketing, technology, business linkages and targeting young people, women, business start-ups and middle level firms. In the 2010/2011 budget, Enterprise Uganda was allocated one billion Uganda shillings. I have not looked at their jobs report, however I think this was a good effort and if they are doing well more resources should be given to them, and others who are pursuing similar efforts. The foregoing should be suplimented by an Entrepreneurship Fund, long term and accessed at 5% interest rate. The idea of establishing a  School Leavers Industrial Training Fund must be de-shelved and implemented.

Arrest Uganda’s productivity and skills deficiency: Ugandan firms have, on average, the lowest labor productivity in the EAC, even when compared to other firms within Sub-Saharan Africa, and much lower than that in China and India . Due to the low productivity, labor costs in Uganda are relatively higher. Studies indicate that Tanzania’s labor productivity is 40% higher than Uganda’s; while Kenya’s labor productivity is 60% higher, meaning that a worker from either Kenya or Tanzania has a higher job output compared to their Ugandan counterpart[1]. The 2011/2012 budget must provide money to kick start reform of BTVET (Business Technical Vocational Education and Training) from input based training to competence based education and training (CBET) through the Uganda Vocational Qualifications Framework (UVQF) will, if properly implemented, go a long way in ensuring that the quality of BTVET graduates meets the labour market demands. Outcomes emanating from a poorly managed BTVET subsector include but not limited to: high youth unemployment, low labour productivity.

 3.      Deepen ICT and Technology Development: Information and Communication  Technologies (ICT) play a major role in upgrading the competitiveness of both domestic and export-oriented industries in Uganda. ICT tools improve operating and communication efficiency within industries and businesses. ICTs help businesses connect with customers, improve logistics flows and make distance to the market or to suppliers of raw materials irrelevant. Therefore, the 2011/2012 budget  should provide for a fund to help democratize ICTs in Uganda. A phased plan to establish computer clinics in all schools and community information hubs in all parishes of Uganda should start with 2011/2012 budget.

4.  Stop budget leakages and runaway public administration expenditure: UGX100 billion is lost in public procurement alone! Public administration expenditure take a whooping 23% share of the national budget, the newly created 17 districts will cost us 28 billion in the coming financial year (money equivalent to drilling of 1030 boreholes), at a population of 33 million and GDP of $16 Billion Uganda runs a parliament of 375 MPS! India with 1 billion people and a GDP of $2698 runs a parliament of 769 MPs. Norway with 4.6 million people has only 43 MPs. I think as a country we badly need to reflect on the cost of this over representation. I therefore wish to recommend that we adopt proportional/ per capita representation of 200,000 population quota. At 33 million, we will have only 165 MPs. The foregoing action will mean that as a country we will save UGX252 billion, money that can be channeled to job creating and productive sectors of the economy. The same measure should also be applied on the executive (return to the 1995 Constitutional provision of only 42 Minister). Balkanisation of Uganda into smalls districts should also be reviewed, halted, rolled back and emphasis be put on service delivery. Citizen budget monitoring efforts should be supported in the 2011/2012 budget, baraazas should be evaluated and given more support.

Conclusion

Uganda is seated firmly on huge opportunities for private sector growth, job creation and transformation; These include, the proliferation of mobile phones, a young population, the discovery of oil, the end of the insurgency in Northern Uganda, the EAC regional integration process, the tripartite EAC/COMESA/SADC FTA, and the birth of a new state- Southern Sudan.  The National Budget should therefore focus more on supporting Private Sector Investments, reducing costs of doing business, value addition to farm produce among others to enhance access to ready markets for their exports. Reducing the high cost of doing business through critical infrastructure development; Enhancement of human capital through critical skills development and health provision ; Increasing the disposable income by enhancing efficiency of productive sectors in order to create wealth and take advantage of opportunities available through value addition particularly, in the Agriculture, Manufacturing and Services sectors including Tourism, Preparation to exploit the Oil natural resource to provide a sustainable source of improvements of lives in the country for the current and future generations. 

Morrison Rwakakamba

Chief Executive Officer

Agency for Transformation

mrwakakamba@gmail.com

http://www.aft-u.org/

Re-imagining agricultural and environmental policy

It’s Arithmetic! Thoughts on reclaiming Uganda’s agricultural extension services.

Everything is Maths. Everything is numbers. Because math is logic. Even music is maths, for mathematics is the basis of sound. Indeed all nature consists of harmony arising out of numbers. Today, I will use numbers to illuminate the tragedy of agricultural extension services in Uganda. For example, on the 02, December, 2011, Dr.Salim Nahdy, the now retired Executive Director of National Agricultural Advisory Services talked to regional Media House- Business times. He affirmed that Uganda has only 1600 extension workers mandated to serve 4,000, 000 million farmer households in Uganda. This is the ratio of 1: 2500 farmer households. Is this practical? Look! We have 365 days in a year. If an extension worker was working 7 days a week, it would take him or her a minimum 6.8 years to do just one round advisory visit to farmer households. So how many farmer households will see an extension worker in a given year? For 7 days of duty in a week, only 365 farmer households will see an extension worker in any given year. This gives us a percentage of approximately 15%. This is the state of affairs in Uganda today. The foregoing assumes that extension workers work for seven days and offer efficient advice to farmers, which in most cases is – anyway- just an assumption!

For example, while holding fireplace conversations with farmers across Uganda, they held strong views that the rural nature of most farm enterprises remains a challenge to graduate and fresh extension workers from college; these fresh professionals –it was reported are keen on urban life rather than spend time with farmers. They are usually hanging out around trading centres watching premiership football and enjoying other trappings of peri-urban life. Are there mechanisms to measure results of extension service providers, who are paid wages from a public purse? Your guess is as good as mine.

How do we crack this state affairs? Do we leave solutions to policy makers and technocrats? Do we stop at calling for reinstatement and restoration of regional district farm demonstrations and stock farms?  A solution may perhaps lie in harnessing private –private and public –private partnerships. There is for example a pool of Extension Link farmers that were in late 1990’s trained by Uganda National Farmers Federation (UNFFE) all over Uganda in Animal Husbandry and Agronomic practices. These extension link farmers can be easily indentified and retooled. They carry yellow and blue certificated bearing their credentials. Can an alliance between the Farmers federation and NAADS bring down the current expansive farmer-extension worker ratio and abridge the current information gap at the farm level? There are other private sector companies like Mukwano and others that have trained and work with a cartel of highly trained and efficient extensionists. Can they be piggybacked on? Government should coordinate and placate them for a national farmer extension services response. Let’s keep thinking.

Morrison Rwakakamba

Chief Executive Officer

Agency for Transformation

mrwakakamba@gmail.com

http://www.aft-u.org/

Re-imagining agricultural and environmental policy

Why the UPDF should be backed to boost agricultural modernization.

For the past eight years, I have been on a learning journey – for the large part dedicated to farming and agricultural systems in Uganda. Of course, I was born and raised in a farmer’ household. I therefore tend to think that this naturalized me into farmers’ daily realities. Recently, I have been thinking about Uganda’s demographic profile in relation to food security and employment opportunities in the country side. Uganda has the youngest population in the world presenting us challenges and opportunities in an equal measure.

Driven by very high fertility rate of nearly 7 children per woman, Uganda’s population is indeed on a surge. The annual population growth is at 3.2%. For example, in 1980 Uganda had 12.7 million people, in 2005, it pulled to 28.7 million- and in constant fertility scenario, by 2025, and Uganda will have 58.1 million inhabitants. By 2050, it will have 152.2 million people (See, Beatrice and Madsen, 2010). If as a country we don’t strategize early to turn the foregoing into an opportunity that comes with high quality and skilled population that can create wealth by driving innovations and markets, such high rate of population growth has potential to create strains on Uganda’s natural resources, including arable land, which in turn drives up poverty rate and threatens future gains in agriculture production and food security. Remember, Uganda has an area of 236,040 square kilometers (146,675 square miles) and a total land boundary of 2,698 kilometers (1,676 miles). This land size is a constant. How will this constant and not wholly arable land feed 152 million Ugandans in 2050? For starters, I wish to propose two interventions;

1.      Support the entry of Uganda Peoples Defense Forces (UPDF) into grand and large scale production: With the success of Wazalendo SACCO in the bag, UPDF has pedigree to partake mass production (and value addition) and contribute massively to food security in Uganda. Indeed from Byzantine times, the role of the armies in food production is a historic duty (constitutes human security): This is so because; food security is possibly the first line of comprehensive peace and security of any country. Countries like Russia don’t have food Siros, but rather keep food and cereal vaults that can feed the population for more than 10 years in an event of crisis. With successful entry of UPDF, we will no longer need World Food Program and other “armies of salvation” to feed Ugandans. The other important advantage is the infusion of the historical role of the Army in high end innovations. All over the World, armies have led agile innovations through their corporate military research strategies; from the most sophisticated planes, software and hardware engineering, geo engineering etc. For instance, Weather modification in the US was seen as a way to increase crop yields (and thus profits), and was kicked off by Project Cirrus, a "cooperative research investigation in cloud physics sponsored by the Signal Corps and the Office of Naval Research, in consultation with General Electric Company" (Stark, 1957: 702).  By focusing on production, the UPDF cooperate with agencies like Uganda Industrial Research Institute, National Agriculture Research Organization etc to invest in innovations that can stimulate new farming knowledge, value addition and thus strengthen the position of Uganda agro-competitiveness in the region.   The private sector, Uganda National Farmers Federation, The Parliament of Uganda and Executive should support the UPDF.

2.      Move fast to harness Information Technology Dividend to promote agriculture. Uganda liberalized telecommunication sector thereby opening the market to both local and foreign investors. This bold step, coupled with the advent of mobile telephony, greatly improved telecommunications in the country. Internet usage is also growing rapidly (usage now at 3,2000,000 with a population of 33,000,000), 10,400,000 connected on mo mobile phones and 228 FM stations. These are huge platforms for horizontal and vertical information flow necessary to boost production and market efficiency. I have come across facebook pages of young urban farmers around Kampala using facebook platform to market eggs and vegetables. This is awesome. State agencies and private sector should accentuate this opportunity- the future of the sector lies in innovations of the young population. The digital divide in rural areas should be narrowed. Where rural electrification agency has succeeded, ICT centers should be established to provide real time information to farming communities and other chain actors. The private sector can take a leading role on this.

I will return next time with more suggestions.

Morrison Rwakakamba

Chief Executive Officer

Agency for Transformation

mrwakakamba@gmail.com

http://www.aft-u.org/

Re-imagining agricultural and environmental policy