LETTERS - Localisation

Support local industry
Written by James Chiwala, Ndola
Monday, December 15, 2008 5:20:11 AM

Please allow me to commend Zambeef Products PLC on it's performance in the past few years. It has diversified into other businesses by acquiring Amanita, investing in a pork processing plant in West Africa and palm oil production in Mpika.

The government should support such companies as this will assist the country to come out of its current economic quagmire. It does not pay to continue complaining about the fall in copper and global food prices when we can bring into being multinational organisations such as Zambeef Products PLC.

I’m a proponent of the belief that we need more indigenous business organisations to go international and bring the much-needed foreign exchange to Zambia.

We should not just encourage foreign investors to establish businesses here at the expense of building local businesses. We need to take advantage of the global village we now live in and bring foreign direct investments into this country.

The same way, for instance, the Nigerian government is supporting its nationals to grow their businesses should serve as a lesson for our own government to do likewise.

I believe that Zambia can gain a lot of foreign exchange, not only from copper receipts, but from other goods and services which can be exported to other countries as well.

It is high time we put an end to dependence on copper to other value added products which can bring about the much-needed foreign exchange to Zambia. We should not mourn over low copper prices when we can support a lot of local businesses.

What we really need is a more focused approach by both the government and the private sector if this country is to achieve the much-talked about positive economic growth. We may have formulated the ‘Vision 2030’ and the Fifth National Development Plan which are very important strategic national papers.

However, the implementation of some of the interventions which are outlined in these documents leave much to be desired.

Finally, I would like to urge the government to provide proper incentives to the manufacturing sector in the budget to be presented in Parliament early next year with Zambeef being a show case. Government support is crucial indeed if such companies are to survive in a turbulent global business environment like the one we are currently facing.



http://www.postzambia.com/content/view/2672/64/

Military intervention on Zim
Written by Concerned Pan-Africanists, Cameroon
Monday, December 15, 2008 5:20:48 AM

We are greatly concerned about threats of military intervention on Zimbabwe, ostensibly in the name of human rights and for humanitarian purposes.

We fully recognise the political impasse in Zimbabwe and the resultant prolonged suffering of its people. For that reason, we appreciate the regional initiatives taken by SADC to resolve this impasse politically.

We are of the view that the political process must be given the space and the opportunity to be resolved in a peaceful and democratic way. The political process is the only way to allow the people of Zimbabwe to arrive at a sustainable solution. We condemn the use of violence to cut short the political process.

We call upon the political actors in Zimbabwe to seek a solution that does not subject its people to suffer the consequences of violence. The duty of African states is to facilitate this process in the spirit of Pan-Africanism as an act of solidarity with the Zimbabwean people.

Experience shows that the inevitable consequence of military intervention to resolve social and political conflicts has been endless wars, as the Democratic Republic of Congo and Somalia clearly demonstrate.

In all these military interventions, millions of people have suffered. Women and children are the most affected. Military interventions exacerbate political and socio-economic crises and internal differences with profoundly detrimental and destructive regional implications.