Very nice to read.
Eventhough I am watching Champions league football, I was captiuvated by your subject and well draged into it. So I eargely read all. It is a brain-share for the future. Yesterday cannot help us but like you put it if the next government should have a Put a man to the moon" ona kind of declaration on Education ( And the arts?) then by 2010 start to train to train for free. There are millions of free money for education worldwide and free satellite services for education. Most African countries are using satellite to run their education and Agricultureal training programmes. Check www.Satellite-links.com and search Africa.
Iin Europeand America students are still paying for their study borrowed fees but they are so well trained and they well perfrom their professional and develpoement services and expertice that the nation benefit and and the country is doing well.
Hope that the party elected will deliever to the people are clear agenda of Eucation for developement that is clear to all Gambians literate and illiterate.
Visions
Oko Drammeh
Malanding Jaiteh <[log in to unmask]> wrote: If one is to go by the NADD Manifesto, The Alliance's Document and the
statement by SoS Touray that the APRC government is to provide farmers
500 tractors, looks like Gambians are poised for the same old, same old
- dump more of our hard borrowed cash into the agriculture basket. By
now it should be clear to all that the trouble in the agricultural
sector is more than just lack of funding. Few would disagree that
dispite two governments, aid from two Chinas plus the West and even
Iran, countless Departments of Agriculture, projects (Mixed Farming,
GARD, Jahali-Pacharr, LADEP) institutions and agencies (NARI, NADA),
and billion of Dalasi, the Gambia is neither self-sufficient in food
production nor has it increase earning from agriculture. Infact the
contribution of agriculture to our national economy has been on the
decline while all these is going on. Given the current state of the
physical environment (climate and water resources) and economic
environment (globalization and crop pricing), it is hard to imagine what
agriculture can do for the Gambia.
Given the above, I would argue that it is high time we take a second
look at agriculture (represented by the Axe and the Hoe on our coat of
arm) as the engine to national development efforts since independence.
I would go a step further to ask the incoming government (APRC, NADD or
The Alliance) to make a "put man on the moon" kind of declaration on
education. Cornerstone of this would be immediate expansion of the
University system and begining 2010 to train free of charge:
2500 undergraduate degree and 100 graduates each year (2010 - 2015)
5000 undergrads and 500 graduate degrees ( after 2015)
In addition to free training, the government should negotiate with US,
EU and other large economies to help provide these with temporary worker
visa. In return the students will be required to pay through their
employers 10% of their salary towards re-embursing the Gambia
government. The idea is to borrow and invest in a product more
marketable than peanuts.
Some back of the envelop calculation:
At the end of the fourth year, with 10000 students * $2,500 per year
tuition is $25,000,000 (the cost of 500 tractors)
suppose 50% of those landed in a job in the UK or US ($35000) per year.
Remittance at 10% of salary is $3,500 * 5000 = $17,500,000. Nay Bad!
and defintely more than what we get from peanuts these days.
This would not include money sent home to family and friend, on
vacations (knowing you do not have to worry about the visa office), on a
retirement house or two (every Gambians wish).
Infact we are losing that many to immigration as we speak. Just that the
ones we are losing now are less prepared to survive in Babilon, with
barely a driver license much more a high school diploma to compete the
skilled labor from Poland or Mexico.
Perhaps I am just dreaming. Certainly I do hope its a dream come true.
Malanding Jaiteh
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