Last week as I took to Twitter and began discussing on agribusiness, I was overwhelmed by the response that I got. I realized that very many young people are venturing into agriculture and quite a number have an interest in it.
However, majority lack the resources, information and guidance on how to go about venturing into this type of business. Now, as the discussions went on, I realized that we lack a good number of technocrats in this particular field. Many young people have studied to be engineers, researchers, scientists in this particular area but I don’t think we have motivated them well enough to have their careers in this field.
The problem with our education system is that, besides concentrating too much on white collar jobs (as the end result), it does not provide a link between theory and practical. I believe it is important to give people the relevant technical knowhow that they need to be successful.The government needs to build more technical institutions and revive those that had collapsed in order to build capacity so that we have quite a number skilled people from the various counties. It beats the purpose to get a researcher or engineer from Nairobi to provide support for a project in Turkana, yet if we built this capacity, we would have very many skilled farm technocrats from every corner of this country.
Soon we will be producing oil and continue to discover other minerals and resources. It’s time we asked ourselves if at all we are prepared for this discovery or we are just waiting for time to pass by. The time for preparation is now. We must help our young people venture into careers that will guarantee them the future that is in this nation and that future is for highly technically qualified people.This is where we are missing people to play a role and we can only encourage such professionals by leveling the playing field and motivating them.
Over the weekend, I was happy to learn that the President and Deputy President visited the 600 hectare farm in Athi River and met with firms implementing the Galana irrigation project, and expressed that irrigation schemes are the way to go and will definitely help tackle food security in the country.
It is good to note that Government has come to the realization that agriculture is the backbone of this economy and are taking the necessary steps to increase food security and promote farming. We must encourage the Government to become a food exporter in the region rather than importing maize and sugar which only enriches the tycoons who have held us hostage with these imports since the days of independence.
Mr. President and Deputy President, I congratulate and support you because this is truly a step in the right direction. However, I hope that as you continue to implement such projects across the country, you will reach out to our own Kenyan farm technocrats who are able and willing to work with your government in improving the lives of Kenyans and growing the economy.
I hope all Kenyans of good will come forward and support all the good things that this government will be doing to make this nation a better place.
Let’s all dedicate this year to the year of agricultural revival. I call upon all experts who have some knowledge on what we can do to increase produce that will feed our people, to come forward and add their knowledge on this. And I appeal to the government to have an open door policy to listen to good ideas and to make sure that the various agricultural institutions are run by competent people of good will who want to achieve great things for Kenya and its people.
I leave you with this question…. Are you born to become a driver or changer of the world, or are you born to pass by and disappear?
Let’s all join hands and be drivers of this economy!
