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Dr. Kiggundu Amin Tamale
Uganda is poor, underdeveloped and cannot feed its people.
What can be done to solve all the intractable problems facing
our country?
Should we hire former presidents of economically vibrant
countries such as Singapore and Malaysia to rule us? Should
we all go for kyeyo (odd jobs) abroad? Should we invite
the British to come and re-colonise us? What should really
be done to develop Uganda?
Some regular writers in the local newspapers, such as ‘development
lecturer’ President Museveni, as well as Okodan Akwap
of Kampala International University, have proposed that
Uganda should emulate the Asian economic tigers such as
Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Japan, South Korea and Indonesia
by adopting an industry-based development strategy and promoting
exports of value added products.
Others such as the smooth-tongued Ethics and Integrity
Minister, Dr. Nsaba Butoro (see God did not curse Africans,
New Vision; September 19, 2007) have suggested that rather
than depend on foreign ideas and external expert knowledge,
Uganda and Africa in general should adopt locally designed
development programmes.
There is also a fad-like and seemingly arcane philosophy
that the promotion of the East African federation would
help promote exports and elevate Uganda’s economic
status. While some of the above development policy proposals
are plausible, their local promoters have tended to ignore
one crucial thing; Uganda’s unique and unfavourable
location.
Unlike the ‘Asian tigers’, Uganda is a land-locked
country with limited access to the sea, which is the cheapest
means of transport.
More importantly, Uganda lacks good infrastructure, such
as modern roads, modern rail systems, or well- established
information and communication technology-related facilities
such as the internet and telephone to reduce the cost of
production, the cost of doing business, as well as its remoteness
and economic isolation.
So, unless deliberate and determined efforts are made to
address the location-induced challenges such as the excessively
high transportation costs, the plan by the government to
expand Uganda’s industrial base and promote exports
of value added products is likely to hit a brick wall.
Perhaps more importantly, the obsession with exports tends
to obscure the fact that the domestic economy matters and
that this sector is as important as the external economy
(export sector).
Related to this, the government’s interventionist
policy stance has tended to focus more on regulating foreign
currency markets to promote exports, ignoring other important
market-ravaged economic sectors such as public transport.
Due to the challenges associated with building a strong
export-oriented economy in Uganda, it is important that
a new strategy is adopted to expand the domestic economy.
My humble view is that the best development policy for Uganda
today is urbanisation—-that is, the transition from
a rural-based society to an urban-based one.
An urban-based development policy is important in part
because modern economies are built, organised and managed
in cities and not in the villages. For example, Bangkok
city accounts for about 44 percent of the entire Thailand
gross domestic product (GDP) of $197billion.
A further benefit of an urban-based development policy
is that urban centres serve as domestic markets for both
industrial and agricultural products. Of equal importance,
there are strong links between urban centres, especially
the real estate sector, and other economic sectors such
as the steel industry, the banking industry, the insurance
industry, brick-making industry, the cement industry, the
power sector and piped water sector.
The links and relationships between the mentioned economic
sectors are essential in creating new jobs and providing
the badly needed economic stimulus.
Urbanisation can also help in reducing the cost of providing
infrastructure such as roads, schools, hospitals, electricity
and piped water. Due to the scattered human settlement patterns
as well as the existence of remote and small villages in
Uganda, it is almost impossible for a resource-constrained
government to provide the above mentioned infrastructure
at the lowest cost possible.
But with the building of well-planned new urban centres,
it becomes easy and cheap to establish a few big schools,
a few big and modern hospitals, a few modern and well maintained
roads, piped water facilities and power facilities to serve
a large number of people living in one place.
In short, there is need to restructure Uganda’s village
dominated population (official statistics show that about
86 percent of Ugandans live in villages) by creating urban
centres that will provide markets and jobs as well as to
stimulate the domestic economic sectors such as agriculture
that are currently lagging behind.
Without adopting a comprehensive and coherent urban policy,
Uganda’s future economic prospects appear to be bleak.
Also, it is almost impossible to transform a rural based
society like Uganda because in the villages there are no
ideas, no role models, no good roads, no good schools and
no good hospitals.
Villages are just incubators for ignorance, diseases like
Ebola and malaria, misery as well as despondence. They should
be eradicated!
The author is an urban and transport expert, Executive
Director of Centre for Urban Studies & Research, as
well as associate consultant in urban planning at the Uganda
Management Institute (UMI).
aminkig@hotmail.com
0773291251
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