IT’S SCANDALOUS TO BE POOR WHEN YOU HAVE MINERAL RESOURCES – WHAT THE MINING INDABA REMINDS ME OF
By Kellys Kaunda
Every time the Mining Indaba takes place in South Africa, our leaders talk of value-addition.
When you hear something too many times, but the experience of life remains the same, you lose trust in political leaders.
If they walked as they talk, mineral-rich nations like Zambia would in practice belong to the premier league of nations.
Copper, our God-given capital is to be found in cell phones, smartphones, computers, television sets, refrigerators, washing machines, dishwashers, dryers, microwaves, household heating elements and plumbing systems.
Beyond household goods, copper is to be found in weapon systems, planes, and much more.
Modern life would not be possible without copper.
So, if we are talking about value-addition, we are talking about creating industries to manufacture any of the above products.
But to do this, we need to train our own people in skills related to such products and the industries that manufacture them.
If we take stock of the skills available in Zambia right now, do we have enough that can handle value-addition of one or two products?
Do we have skills’ training institutions targeting Zambia’s minerals?
Is our education system oriented towards value-addition?
Can our graduates manufacture a fridge, a smartphone, heating elements, etc,?
Countries that talked value-addition immediately embarked upon value-addition.
They didn’t wait years. They climbed down the podiums from which they made the speeches and went on the ground to put up infrastructure and began training their citizens and began making things.
Here, we like planning too much and waiting until we cross every “t” only to end up with policy documents!
Currently, we are on the Eighth National Development Plan.
What do we have to show for the past seven national development plans?
How many mining indabas have we attended and how many products have we manufactured as a result?
Nothing!
We need political leaders with a mindset of a businessman who is not afraid to fail.
Stop making big speeches and stop attending conferences and put your hands to the plough.
Ba Kaunda, the problem is you are waiting for the politicians to make the first move. What are you yourself doing about the problem of value addition? A country develops because its citizens are adventurous, they are enterprising.
You don’t need to start with assembling cell phones. Think of simple tools that would make an ordinary citizen’s life easier. Like a hand groundnut sheller or planter. What we need to do is reorient our people to constantly think about how they can improve on performing a given task. This must be an ever present preoccupation of everyone engaged in any repetitive task.
Our biggest enemy is that we are comfortable with performing a task the same way day in and day out. Politicians don’t create wealth or ideas. It is private citizens who drive innovation. Policians only create an enabling environment. Wake up Mr. Kellys Kaunda.