By Dr Barnabas Taremwa
Tomorrow, February 26, President Yoweri Museveni will launch the Parish Development Model (PDM) in Kibuku district.
Under the model all parishes in the country will get over sh180b for eradicating poverty from households.
The parish model is a good initiative to improve household incomes and standards of living. It fits within Uganda’s target of achieving middle income status and drastically cutting the rising levels of poverty.
Poverty levels are highest in rural areas where most households survive on subsistence farming which only provides food to mouth with no surplus to sell and earn income.
As a farmer I believe that if well implemented the Parish model will spur unprecedented transformation especially in rural areas where millions live below the poverty line.
Government is starting with sh17m per parish for this financial year and then in the next financial year it will be sh100m per parish, so between now and July we have sh17m for each parish.
There are 10, 595 parishes in Uganda and if all them received sh17m each, the government would have spent over sh180b this financial year to kick-start the implementation of this programme.
PDM model is a planned approach to development under National Development Plan III, with the parish as the lowest unit for delivering services closer to the people and hence fostering local economic development.
Local leaders and those involved in implementing the model should ensure that it is not affected by issues that have previously affected some government programmes like corruption. Those in charge should understand that this time they are undertaking a patriotic service.
Abuse of the implementation will be betray of the country. Anyone found engaging in any activities that undermine smooth implementation of the parish model should be treated as a traitor to Ugandans.
The model will deliver services closer to the people leading to faster transformation of the subsistence households into the money economy.
This new anti-poverty programme is different from the current initiatives such as the Youth Livelihood programme. Unlike others the parish model is designed to be implemented in a down-up approach, and not top-down which is from the central government level.
However, the parish model should be seen as part of the bigger approach in poverty eradication. The model alone is not a magic bullet to ending poverty but rather a big boost.
We can do more to supplement the parish model. Number one I propose that as a country we should start moving away from the hand hoe. If we can have two tractors per Sub County, the output will be much greater. This will result in meaningful production at the local level. We should also make an inventory of commercial farmers in every district and provide them with sustainable mechanised irrigation systems.
Government should also do a geo-system survey to establish availability of water table production and introduce production wells (boreholes). This would be a meaningful investment to fight poverty and unproductive methods of work in villages where children and women trek miles to fetch water.
The approach to modernising society must be looked at by using a formula of ease of increasing production with less manual labour and access to water for domestic consumption and farming.
If we don’t address the hand hoe issue, if we don’t address the irrigation factor, if we can’t address access to clean water, then we are condemned to stay in poverty regardless of how much money we can distribute to our poor societies.
Like the old adage goes; instead of giving a poor man fish you would rather teach him how to fish.
Dr Taremwa Barnabas B is the Chairman Rainbow Ranchers &Group of companies