The Uganda government recently launched its ambitious five-year national development plan which requires 54 trillion shillings to transform the country into a modern and prosperous one within 30 years.
p style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">The Uganda government recently launched its ambitious five-year national development plan which requires 54 trillion shillings to transform the country into a modern and prosperous one within 30 years.
The national development plan was drawn up by the National Planning Authority (NPA) a government body and launched by president Yoweri Museveni. The plan, which focuses on creating jobs and raising household incomes, envisages that Uganda will be a middle income economy by 2017.
The transformation will be attained through raising human skills and gender equality, improving business competition as well as addressing the structural bottlenecks in the economy in order to accelerate socioeconomic transformation for prosperity.
President Museveni said to transform Uganda, power, roads, railway, training of human resources, market, liberal economic policies and the promotion of the private sector were necessary adding that the economy was doing well at 5.5 percent growth rate in the 1960s.
He said 2 billion barrels of oil had been discovered and an oil refinery would be constructed in western Uganda and a pipeline from Eldoret in Kenya to Kampala.
There will also be focus on agriculture, industry and promotion of science and technology and innovations. The government will pursue outward-oriented policies by encouraging foreign investments and exports with high value addition and pursuing sound macro economic policies and management.
The chairperson of the Africa Peer Review Mechanism, professor Adebayo Adedeji said planning was the backbone of transformation and warned against guessing and the recycling of old statistics.
The plan highlights the oil and gas sector and says there will be continued exploration across the country, continuous geological mapping, licence complement oil companies and carry out commercial production.
The will also build infrastructure for distribution, regulate midstream activities, develop refineries, stock sufficient petroleum products and facilitate private sector participation.
Geoffrey Muleme
