eBusiness Weekly
Business Writer
The African continent can realise greater economic turnaround if member states drive industrialisation agenda and mechanisation of the agriculture sector, according to visiting Kenyan public speaker and Professor Patrick Lumumba.
Lumumba revealed this while addressing delegates at the CEO Africa Roundtable meeting held in Harare yesterday under the theme, “leading Africa into Industrialisation through strategic leadership”.
Lumumba highlighted that African governments should be at the centre of industrialisation agenda through the formulation of policies critical in the creation of an industrialisation enabling ecosystem.
This will eliminate Africa’s overreliance on finished products from Europe, Asia, and the Americas when the continent had the potential to industrialise and manufacture its own products.
Africa’s manufacturing sector contribution to the continent’s gross domestic product is reported to have declined from 12 percent in 1980 to 11 percent in 2013, where it has remained stagnant over the past few years, according to the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA).
Zimbabwe has lately been moving towards the education 5.0 policy that aims to inculcate an education system that thrives to attain more innovation and industrialisation in university and college students.
Lumumba bemoaned the current position in which many African nations have regressed in terms of industrialisation compared to the early years of independence (the 1970s)
Critically, Lumumba cited the energy sector as a vital cog in attaining the industrialisation goal alluding that limited energy (less than 10 000 Megawatts) was not enough to sustain energy demands for industrialisation, hence implored the African countries to invest more in setting up of alternative sources of energy.
He decried the current state in which African countries have remained a source of raw materials for value addition by other highly industrialised countries particularly in Europe and China lately.
“Many countries in the world have looked at Africa as a sphere of influence which is a source of raw materials and they have engaged with Africa on that basis, there was a time when these multinationals did not want to see an industrialised Africa because they wanted Africa to remain a source of raw materials and primary goods,” said Lumumba.
Further, he called African leaders to take deliberate steps towards research and funding of industries like mining, energy, medical, and automobile among other industries which have long been dominated by Asia, European and American countries.
Experts are of the view that the main reason for Africa’s slow industrialization is that its leaders have failed to pursue bold economic policies.
Turning to agriculture he highlighted that governments should invest in mechanization of the sector and be self-reliant as far as food is concerned.
He urged African tertiary students to desist from shunning agriculture as it forms the basis of humankind’s sustenance hence critical.
“Africa is a net importer of food every day, we cannot leave in such an environment if a country cannot feed itself then that country is going nowhere.
“Young people do not want to get into faculties of agriculture, they think that agriculture is something that is not useful, yet the single thing we do is to eat,” stressed Lumumba.
Professor Lumumba is a renowned public speaker and a fellow of the Institute of Certified Public Secretaries of Kenya FCPS and a pan Africanist who is passionate about promoting equal rights, good governance, and African unity,
