Agricultural and Economic Federalism in the Republic of South Sudan
By John Yool, Canada
October 24, 2015 (SSB) — There has been a high octane debate about whether the President’s decision to divide up the country into 28 states is legitimate or not. I will not wade into such a sensitive matter but will leave it to the citizens to support or oppose it. However, one thing is certain and that is agricultural and economic federalism if we are to be a hunger-free-country.
This will call for a straightforward transformation of our agricultural system to suit the needs of our farmers. The national government must take the lead in spreading agricultural skills to the grassroot level across the country with the help of states’ governments.
At every village level, there must be an agriculturalist to guide the farmers. The agriculturalist must be an employee of the national government. Such employee will be responsible to a county agriculturalist also appointed by the national government and supervised by the state agricultural minister.
The state agricultural minister has a role to play. He or she will be the primary recipient of the budget but can allocate the funds to the counties, which will then allocate it to respective villages.
As for such, we must not make it a socialistic model. We want the process to be sustainable and not to overburden the national government and the states’ governments. The farmers must be organized and encouraged to form cooperatives.
Each farmer will make a contribution to the cooperatives which they will use to buy fuel for the tractors, subsidize seeds, pesticides and to market their produce as a group instead of leaving it to each farmer.
By the end of the day the national government and states’ government get returns for their investment while our farmers have something for us as a country.
When it comes to selling surplus, the national government with the help of states’ government will buy the surplus at the market prices. Nevertheless, the same stored food will be sold to people across the country during dry seasons and in spring at affordable prices.
If we do so, we will not lack food and foreign aid will be buried in our dictionary of thoughts. These are my thoughts and I encourage fellow intellectuals to promote such a national dialogue.
Who knows, agricultural and economic success will make our country a force to reckon with.
John Yool, the author, is a South Sudanese agricultural economist who resides in Canada
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