Public, private cooperation to spur investment in Zambia’s agric
Written by Millennium on August 15, 2019
BUUMBA CHMBULU writes
EFFECTIVE cooperation between public and private sectors will attract and expand investment in Zambia’s agriculture sector, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has said.
FAO country representative Gorge Okech said effective cooperation between the public and private sectors were key in promoting ‘joined –up’ thinking that ensured policy and programmatic coherence.
The cooperation, he said, could be enhanced through Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) which were an important mechanism for attracting investment and technical expertise in Zambia’s agriculture sector.
Mr Okech said PPPs had the potential to transform the agriculture sector and deliver multiple benefits that could contribute towards the pursuit of inclusive agricultural development.
He was speaking during the multi-stakeholders dialogue in Lusaka.
“We have already observed cases of highly successful agri-PPPs, however the successful cases and the good practices need to be scaled up and replicated to achieve impact at scale,” he said.
Mr Okech said innovative partnerships that brought together business, Government, smallholder farmers and civil society were increasingly being promoted as a mechanism to improve productivity and rive inclusive growth in the agricultural sector.
And Ministry of Agriculture permanent secretary, Songowayo Zyambo, explained that Zambia had not yet fully exploited its potential in agriculture due to low investments and participation of the private sector.
He said capacity building of the domestic small and medium agro –enterprise sector and a strong advocacy for the creation of a stable and predictable policy environment conducive to private sector investment were key to creating an agricultural transformation in Africa.
“Zambia has a huge potential for agriculture development and for this reason it has been identified as a key reason to the economic diversification poverty reduction, employment creation and economic growth,” Mr Zyambo said
