Botswana Government has recently declared that the country is going through a partial drought.
From the look of things, the drought situation in Botswana will get worse before it gets any better.
Not only have food crops failed across many parts of the country thereby threatening the country’s already weakened food security, the past two years have also seen many parts of the country being ravaged by Foot and Mouth Disease┬á from which the country is still to fully recover.
For many parts of the country, farmers are still not able to sell their cattle, this over and above the fact that crops wilted long before they could be harvested.
Even before the current drought season, Botswana, like the rest of the world, was still reeling from high food prices which are in the main a by product of international geopolitics against which, as a country, we have no control whatsoever.
All these phenomena come in the backdrop of growing difficulties that our economy is grappling with.
The latest information is that the world diamond market could be headed for more turbulence, which as has happened in the past could affect Botswana’s ability to raise the much needed cash to see through some of the many outstanding projects.
We welcome government’s reasoning behind declaring this year a drought season. Where we differ with government is in their analysis that the drought is partial.
We need not remind anyone that for many of our people the drought season did not start the day government made an official announcement.
For many families across the country, the drought was already a part of them long before their crops failed.
This was so because since around 2007 many families have been literally struggling to get by, owing in no small measure to the economy that was beginning to deteriorate. We have to point out that since then the economy has not yet recovered ÔÇô five years down the line.
Since 2007, many of our people have been out of work, out of pocket and we may add, out of luck, too. Many young people who completed their school around that time have still not been able to get any kind of employment. Many have been retrenched and getting even the most basic meal on the table is a struggle for too many of them.
Businesses are struggling to barely survive, which leads them to stop hiring new staff.
Looking for employment has become a hopeless undertaking for many because there is simply no employment to look for.
Rising food prices and the endemic drought that we are going through mean that whatever gains we had achieved as a country to lift people from poverty are being reversed.
Too many of our people who were still on the brink, but were rescued enough to take care of themselves and their families will as a result of the high food prices go back into the very trap of poverty that our government has spent the last thirty years or so trying saving them out of.
That is regrettable.
Even more disheartening is a painful realization that because of the deteriorating world economy, Botswana government is today much less prepared, much less able and indeed less capable of cushioning its people than was the case before 2007/08 financial year.
All the initiatives announced by Government to mitigate drought are indeed welcome.
All we can say at this juncture is to call on government to ensure that the programmes so announced do indeed benefit the weakest members of our society who are the most vulnerable during these hard economic times.
In the past, government programmes meant for the poor have tended to benefit the elite and the business community while leaving out the intended recipients.
Botswana has often prided itself of the knowledge that no citizen of this country dies from hunger and/or starvation.
But this time around, if we are not careful to ensure that government programmes reach the intended beneficiaries we are in danger that a few months down the line we will be counting the dead as a result of poverty, hunger, high food prices and drought.
