The agriculture sector has the greatest potential to reduce unemployment and underemployment in sub-Saharan Africa, Namibia’s Head of Delegation to the Southern African Development Community Parliamentary Forum (SADC-PF), Phillipus Katamelo has said.
Katamelo said this is due to the region’s growing youth population while speaking at the 53rd Plenary Assembly Session of the SADC Parliamentary Forum, which is taking place in Arusha, Tanzania, from 02 to 08 July.
“Despite increasing employment rates in non-agricultural sectors, the continent’s primary industry will remain a source of income for our citizens,” Katamelo said.
Katamelo stated that the agricultural sector can contribute to important continental and regional goals such as eradicating poverty and hunger, as well as promoting intra-African trade and investment.
“Our trade with each other is less than 15 per cent. We have set ourselves up for failure by design,” he stated.
Katamelo further added that the fact that African nations do not trade with each other, nor see it as a priority, is the reason why young people do not see the sector as profitable. He urged parliaments to address these challenges through inclusive legislation and frameworks that ensure young, able people have access to land, natural resources, infrastructure, finance, technology, and fair remuneration for workers and producers.
According to Roger Mancienne, the Speaker of the National Assembly of Seychelles, Africa has the highest percentage of unused arable land in the world, and southern Africa is a region rich in fertile soil and natural resources, with an inherent potential to generate agricultural products and food items.
“This is important in terms of agriculture and food security, as well as youth employment,” Mancienne said.
“In particular, recent years have been marked by high inflation, and since several food products in Africa are imported, the cost of living has risen for most households while the incomes of citizens have remained the same.”
Mancienne further said this has created imbalances in food availability, especially in remote areas where the cost of transportation is high and where merchants no longer find it viable to purchase products and food items.
The Plenary Assembly is a regional inter-parliamentary body that was established in 1997. Its member states are Angola, Botswana, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Eswatini, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Seychelles, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
Source: The Namibian Press Agency