Planning, planning, but not much more!

By Editor

Editorial Cartoon

It would be most rash, even cynical, to suggest that all development plans and all measures aimed at forestalling danger or mitigating the impact of disasters don’t count for anything.

Benjamin Franklin, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States, aptly intoned centuries ago: “By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.”

The remark by the noted polymath leading author, printer, political theorist, politician, postmaster, scientist, musician, inventor, satirist, civic activist, statesman and diplomat is of immense relevance to this day.

But there a clear distinction between actually planning and pretending to plan, and few communities and institutions are without cases supporting this fact.

For instance, is it not four long decades since it was officially resolved that the official seat of the government would move from Dar es Salaam to Dodoma?

And, is it not true that there is not much on the ground to prove willingness to translate the declaration of intent into something more concrete?

But the much wider picture of the country’s economic landscape shows that this is just the tip of the iceberg, most especially with regard to agriculture.

It has long been widely acknowledged that the cash and food crops that have made the list of Tanzania’s “traditional agro-based exports” would have earned us much higher levels of foreign exchange if they underwent some form of processing or refinement before they were actually exported.

A recent study on the challenges associated with value addition practices as relate to agricultural commodities in Tanzania quotes the 2008 national agricultural marketing policy as saying the government has been “striving to commercialise crops by demonstrating approaches to profitable agricultural production systems, increased market access and value-added activities in targeted rural communities”.

 

The study, by Joel Johnson Mmasa, underlines the importance of activities focusing on strengthening market access and expanding markets for valued added products, intensifying production, improving quality and promoting engagement in post-harvest value addition.

Indeed, some headway has been made for example, with respect to the likes of tobacco, cotton and sugarcane, even if it is thanks to intervention by foreign investors engaging advanced technologies and huge capital resources.

 

However, most of our crops are still marketed in their raw forms, which analysts see as against the letter and spirit of Kilimo Kwanza and denying our people golden opportunities for higher earnings and generating employment.

Experts confess to these constraints, but rightly insist that the potential for agro-processing to cut post-harvest crop losses while also boosting personal incomes and government revenue cannot be overemphasized.

Now, Morogoro-based Sokoine University of Agriculture University (SUA) has announced plans to introduce degree courses in the economy and technology of hides, skins and leather effective from academic year 2014/2015.

It says the aim is to encourage students to grab and benefit from opportunities available in a largely dormant sub-sector.

It remains to be seen whether the Tanzania Commission for Universities will endorse the plan, which reportedly already has the blessings of the Tanzania Commission for Science and Technology (Costech), or whether it will continue to be the bitter-sweet song we are used to of grand ideas, fantastic strategies and wonderful plans never graduating into projects and programmes with a future.

 

SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN