There is no question about the fact that for Botswana to go to the next level, there is need for economic reform. We can no longer rely on the past experiences. Diamonds have for too long been the country’s mainstay. But it was always clear that diamonds could only go thus far. New ways of doing things are needed. Productivity is one such attribute that is deeply needed to induce new fl air in the country’s economy. Other than productivity we need to look to the east and learn how some Asian countries have made it. These are countries like Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea and indeed China. All these countries have one thing in common. They have harnessed investments in science and technology to drive they economies. Science and technology ensure economic dynamism, the kind of which Botswana badly needs. Science and technology lead to progress. Science and technology lead to human prosperity. Evidence of economic growth potential in science and technology is easy to show ÔÇô even at company level. That evidence is nowhere more visible than in the growth of multi-national technology companies: Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon Facebook to name but a few. The combined value of these companies runs into trillions of American Dollars.
Apple alone, by far the biggest company in the world has a total value that easily shadows GDPs of most African countries. And it continues to grow. Investing in science and technology has given above mentioned countries a kind of might that was unimaginable only 50 years ago. These are countries that during that time were at the same developmental level as Botswana ÔÇô or in some cases lower. Natural resources like diamonds have been good for Botswana. But there is no question that such resources have done their time. And it is beginning to show in the dwindling income the country gets from diamonds compared to yesteryears. Unless we increase investments in science and technology, the much hyped talk of Botswana becoming a knowledge economy will soon become a bad joke the same way that has been economic diversification and projects once erected to achieve it like BEDIA, BITC and the once mighty IFSC. The Botswana International University of Science and Technology should be used to put the country on a path to economic development That would mean more than doubling that university’s current budget of just over P400 million today.
In fact it would be prudent for BIUST to be removed from the regular requirements and procedures of government budgetary processes. BIUST should ideally be treated as an ongoing special project, if as a country we are to realize even a fraction of what the university was set up to achieve. Demanding that BIUST follow the same structured financial regulations like other departments can only delay what is otherwise supposed to be a fast-tracked national emergency. The triumph of science and technology is perhaps no more visible anywhere in the world than China. In the late 1970, the once rigid Chinese Revolution was loosened by economic policies of opening up and liberalisation. Those economic reforms had as their crux nothing but exalted investments in science and technology. Just over thirty years down the line, those efforts have uplifted millions of people from poverty and created an economy that is the second largest in the world.
The story of Chinese economic reforms is not only ongoing, all evidence point to the fact that it has only just begun. China has deployed science and technology to fasten economic growth, create more wealth, create more jobs and create an ever expanding middle-class. That same story has been adopted in Malaysia, Singapore and South Korea. Over the last decade alone, China has doubled the number of its science related universities. Today China produces more engineers than the whole world put together.
On account of massive investments in science and technology, China is today the world centre of the still unfolding global tech-revolution ÔÇô way ahead of even the traditional super-houses like Germany and the United States. No country has been able to reduce poverty in the way that China has done. There have been doubts expressed about the integrity of much of Chinese economic data. But even then, what achievements have been made cannot be denied. A recent report by the McKinsey Global Institute ÔÇô a leading business consultancy has proved that one in three of the world’s start-up businesses that are valued at over $1 billion are Chinese companies. That same report says today China accounts for 40% of the world’s ecommerce transactions ÔÇô up from a paltry 1% just less than a decade ago.
That alone shows the value of harnessing technology and investing in science related innovation, research and education. Going forward, Botswana’s economic lethargy can only be reversed by more ÔÇô not less investments in science and technology. We need to produce more engineers, more scientists, more doctors and less soft art graduates.
