As the country makes endeavours to alleviate poverty a legislator has observed
The Mawogola South MP Gorreth Namugga was concerned that the trillions allocated in the national budget to constitute cash handouts to help beneficiaries start and grow enterprises have on many occasions been either misused or misallocated with no tangible positive impact created in transforming people’s lives
She reasoned that the cash allocated to people She reasoned that the cash allocated to people to deal with unemployment are pretty insignificant, given the available amount compared millions of people that would wish to access it
“Uganda government needs to take a more sustainable and impactful approach to poverty alleviation by focusing on more strategic long term entrepreneurship growth-oriented intervention rather than short -term cash handouts that are even too little to satisfy our fast-growing population,” she said.
She was addressing residents of Sembabule district at St Primary School -Mateete over the weekend at the closing of a one – week Business Enterprise Start-up Tool training she organized in partnership with Enterprise Uganda
Ugandan Food Recipes
Namugga enumerated a number of poverty elevation schemes including but not limited to: Entandikwa, youth Livelihood Programs Uganda Women Entrepreneurship program, Emyooga and parish Development Model, in which the government has over the years pumped trillions inform of cash handouts, but on a critical value for money audit, the country is always at a loss, for hardly can one find progressive business persons whose success is attributed the same interventions.
Government recently earmarked an additional Shs 100m to benefit more households, the total PDM funds since inception hits Shs 2.4 trillion; Shs 1m is earned per house hold.
The Correct Line
The MP proposed that government instead ought to primarily channel more financial resources towards supporting business – oriented mindset change initiatives, because failure in financial life in most instance is caused by lack of knowledge and motivation to engage in the right ways.
Charles Ocici, the executive director Enterprise Uganda, pledged that his entity would strengthen capacity, reach many more Ugandans and spread the mindset change message about entrepreneurship, encourage them to start and empower them to run sustainable business journeys.
“A positive mindset is powerful tool for transforming communities and fostering sustainable entrepreneurship, many potential entrepreneurs struggle with limiting beliefs fear of failure and dependency on external aid by fostering mindset change initiatives, we can unlock entrepreneurial potential and drive long term economic growth,” he said.
Ocici cautioned Sembabule residents against over concentrating on perennial cash crop like coffee, neglecting other traditional food crops like cassava, sweet potatoes and matooke; otherwise, many could find themselves selling coffee to buy food.
Yasin Lulangwa, a local farmer and educationist pointed that rural transformation needs a stronger helping hand from government in form of; subsidizing the cost of agro- processing equipment, irrigation initiatives, regulating borrowing costs easing access to markets availing improved seedling, construction of modern valley dams- all being catalytic factors for boosting agricultural production and productivity.
