Timing is (almost) everything. At some point it will be the right time to impose a full importation ban on some goods. Right now, it appears it not the best thing to do, atleast for our SMEs.
While it appears that the time to build capacity of our indigenous enterprisers has long passed it’s never too late to put up a strategy on that and implement it.
The recent government ban on the importation of some horticultural goods has come as reminder that we have neglected an important aspect of growing a healthy SME sector in our country. The growth of a healthy, competitive SME sector will be maximised when there is a strong enterprise culture in the society at all levels. This is why it is vital that we develop a culture of enterprise amongst our people, the kind that rewards individual as well as collective initiatives and innovations. The first step towards the creation of such a culture lies in education. Our basic education curriculum should be revised and reflect the aspirations to be an entrepreneurial society. The new curriculum will not just produce the best entrepreneurs but also result in well informed customers. By well-informed I mean the kind that would know the Pros and Cons of supporting local business enterprises.
The end result would be a socio-economic climate that encourages a high rate of business startup and survival leading to an overall growth of the SME sector. A well-crafted curriculum, whether at basic level or through outreaches, would result in a sympathetic and entrepreneurial environment for our SMEs. As a developing country we have known for the longest time that SMEs, precisely local owned ones have been a mainstay of many economies across the globe for centuries. The end results is not just economic growth but also the renewal of social contract between the state and its citizens. As seen in other countries, developing human resources is at the heart of how a government can build trust and promote lasting social change. While governments alone cannot create that ‘enterprise culture’, their actions can destroy or facilitate it.
The recent ban on importation of certain horticultural goods has marked the death of some of the local SMEs as their businesses survival relied solely on such goods given the pricing politics. This is why we should use this moment to reflect on where we are now, and what need to be done to ensure that when we impose trade restrictions our SMEs do not turn out to be the biggest causalities. We have to use this moment to ensure that all interested parties have a role to play so as to put to an end a misplaced and self-depreciating national psyche that everything that is produced in Botswana is of inferior quality. It is during times of economic crisis like the one created by Covid 19 pandemic globally that individuals, families, classes and whole section of society are torn up and reconfigured. In a post Covid 19 Botswana, we surely need to take heed of Adam Smith’s warnings about unchecked corporate power backed by the state. The real story behind the latest horticultural goods importation ban says it all. The movement of chess pieces done by major players in the retail sector before and following this particular ban makes it necessary to speed up the process of democratising economics. A well-crafted curriculum, formal or informal will result in an increased participation by members of the public in decision making. Without being able to speak the language of economics, it hard for our people to raise a meaningful voice on key decisions such as the one made by the Agriculture ministry to close out horticultural products.
The truth of the matter is that persistent economic inequality and a geographically uneven recovery have left many Batswana deeply frustrated, more especially after Covid 19 pandemic. Regrettably, the economic inequality we find ourselves in was partially sponsored by our failure to build capacity of businesses owned by the locals. At this ;point, our way out is to rebuild trust and write a new social contract – two things that are more critical during times of economic recovery. Batswana have been very vocal on issues related to their wealth creation. They are at a point where they are actually aware that they continue to be fed crumbles of their country’s economic pie. Out leaders also surely know what need to be done. They can chose to turn a blind eye on the immediate needs and let the boat sink with the citizens or do something to avoid unrest. At the end of the day, investing in citizens is critical to any serious government seeking to make a real difference in the lives of its people. For the Botswana government, the immediate challenge is to build capacity.
The #Bottomline is that building capacity of our enterprises, more especially SMEs is more urgent than some of these trade restrictions.
