Stats Botswana completes first phase of agric census
Pauline Dikuelo | Wednesday September 9, 2015 17:50
SB manager of communication, documentation and dissemination, Lillian Setimela told Mmegi Business that the first phase focussed on traditional agricultural holdings, which cover rural areas including urban villages.
The traditional holdings census ran from January to September this year and was followed by commercial agricultural holdings, which is expected to end in December.
The commercial agricultural holdings cover agricultural farms or ranches on freehold land, leasehold land and tribal grazing land on communal holdings land.
According to Setimela after the compilation of data in December, SB will hand over the collected data to the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA), which will disseminate the information after six months.
“Through the period, MoA would analyse the information and use it to make informed decisions regarding the agricultural sector. They would also share the information with the relevant stakeholders,” said Setimela.
The census is conducted in collaboration with MoA to help achieve the ministry’s vision of ensuring food security and global competitiveness of agricultural products.
It is also expected to develop policies and programmes to improve performance of the agricultural sector in the country.
“The public has been cooperative throughout the entire collection. We expect the same during the commercial census. We have also been attending agricultural fairs to sensitise farmers about the importance of the census,” said Setimela.
She said recently they attended the Ghanzi Agricultural Fair, Serowe Fair as well as the Gaborone Agricultural Fair where she said they managed to mobilise and reach out to farmers.
The first agricultural census was conducted in 1971 and focussed only on livestock.
Another one, which covered both crops and livestock, was carried out in 1982. The third agricultural census was conducted in 1993, while the last one was in 2004.
The past agricultural censuses were conducted by the then Central Statistics Office in collaboration with MoA and sometimes with technical assistance from Food and Agricultural Organisation, as was the case in 1993.
The agricultural sector contributes less than three percent to the Gross Domestic Product primarily through beef exports.
Although most farmers practise subsistence farming, agricultural production can supply food to only half the population, which is attributed to various factors like poor soil and erratic rainfall.