Majority of Tanzanians remain poor
despite an impressive seven per cent average annual GDP growth rate due
to domination of foreign owned investments in top economic sectors, with
limited linkage to the ordinary citizens.
According to the Tanzania Human
Development (THD) Report 2014, economic growth, though necessary, is not
enough to address abject poverty inflicting people.
University of Dar es Salaam’s (UDSM)
economic lecturer, Dr Wilhelm Ngasamiaku, presenting the report at the
report’s dissemination workshop in Dodoma, said instead of focusing on
output expansion, the country needs to emphasise on changing the
qualitative features of production that occur through growth process.
“Economic growth by itself has failed to
expand the ability of majority Tanzanians to lead the kind of lives
they value,” said Dr Ngasamiaku, advocating for economic transformation
for human development.
According to the report, with the
exception of some notable progress in few areas such as child survival
and school enrolment, improvement in the overall status of human
development in the country remains minimal, with the country falling
seven positions in the global UN Development Programme’s 2014 human
development index ranking.
Dr Ngasamiaku said the status of THD
used Human Development Index whose three dimensions are health,
knowledge and income as well as Multidimensional Poverty Index, a
three-dimensional assessment that represents three 10 indicators in
human development.
The 10 indicators in MPI are nutrition
and child mortality under health, years of schooling and school
attendance under education as well as type of cooking fuel, sanitation,
availability of clean and safe water, access to electricity, type of
floor and ownership assets as indicators of living standards.
Discussing the report, the participants,
mostly academics, said the key to economic prosperity in Tanzania lies
with transformation of the agricultural sector.
Professor Severene Rugumamu said
mechanisation of the country’s agriculture was inevitable if the
impressive economic growth has to trickle down to the ordinary
Tanzanians.
“We have to get rid of the hand hoe
peasants if we have to transform agriculture, which employs the majority
citizens,” said Prof Rugumamu.
He said the country has to go for large
scale commercial farming, with introduction of insurance products in
farming to adequately manage the industry related risks.
“Insurance is a critical catalyst that
is missing in the farming sector...the risks in agriculture are not well
managed as a result,” charged the don, proposing certification of
people entering the farming industry.
“Farming should never be for rejects who
have failed elsewhere,” he said. Dr Innocent Karamagi said there was no
miracle for success, charging that only hard work, discipline and
change of mindset will rescue Tanzanians out of abject poverty.
Source: Daily News, reported by Masato Masato, from Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
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