AS the circus and confusion with regards to the doctors and nurses’ strike continues unabated, it is time government shows sincerity to both the disgruntled medical practitioners and the general public.
We believe instead of applying bullying tactics and blackmailing the striking health professionals, government should genuinely seek to understand their grievances and seek to resolve them.
It serves no purpose for government officials to bully the health professionals when thorny issues which gave birth to the industrial action are still pending.
It’s no longer time to play blame or hide-and-seek games as the stalemate has caused innumerable deaths, which would have been avoided had the parties quickly found each other and resolved their differences.
For once, let the truth and common sense prevail. This includes government providing the critical drugs and equipment that it has consistently ignored.
The majority of Zimbabweans depend on the woefully underfunded health system and, as a result, health workers watch helplessly as patients die of diseases that could be easily treated.
Some of the health professionals’ demands on remuneration resonate with almost all public servants and the rest of the working public, whose earnings are undeniably no longer sustainable at the current rate of inflation in the country.
While health professionals’ demands might sound ridiculous, they need not be dismissed at face value, as most of them serve to just remind government of its skewed priorities.
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For instance, our government is a signatory to the Abuja Declaration that obliges it to allocate at least 15% of the national budget to the health sector, but year after year, we find our health sector sustained by donor funding, as Treasury seems oblivious of the need to prioritise health issues.
There is a growing and worrisome tendency to deliberately underfund the health hoping that the donor community would always chip in on humanitarian grounds.
How else can government explain this, given that most top bureaucrats, including members of the Presidium, prefer to outsource their healthcare needs, while the majority are made to make-do with the archaic system back home?
This only confirms that our leadership has no confidence in our local health system.
The issue of health funding is of paramount importance. Living is an inalienable right provided for in the Bill of Rights and government should guarantee that, otherwise it will be found guilty of denying its citizens that right.
The high disease burden from preventable diseases such as cholera and typhoid which wreaked havoc in most urban centres in the past years is characteristic of health underfunding.
The industrial actions are, therefore, a wake-up call to President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s second republic to revisit its health policy and budget priorities.- Mwanawevhu
Sustainable use of wild species contributes to UN SDGs realisation
SUSTAINABLE use of wild species has and can have an even more significant contribution to the realisation of United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
What is currently recognised as the potential role of wild species in meeting SDGs and how it pales in comparison to the substantial contribution remains untapped.
Among environmental drivers, climate change, pollution and invasive alien species in particular impact the abundance and distribution of wild species and this, in turn, impacts their sustainability, and in turn their ability to contribute to human well-being.
Global trade in wild species increases substantially without effective regulation across supply chains — from local to international.
Global trade of wild species generally increases pressures on wild species, leading to unsustainable use and sometimes to wild population collapses — such as the shark fin trade.
Illegal trade in wild species represents the third-largest class of all illicit trade, with estimated annual values of up to US$199 billion. Timber and fish make up the largest volumes and value of illegal trade in wild species.
To address a global biodiversity crisis that is growing urgent with every passing day, seven key elements with the potential to significantly promote sustainable use of wild species can be taken into consideration.
These include policy options that are inclusive and participatory, that recognise and support multiple forms of knowledge and policy instruments and tools that ensure fair and equitable distribution of costs and benefits.
It further stressed the need for context-specific policies monitoring wild species and practices.
These policy instruments should be aligned at international, national, regional, and local levels and maintain coherence and consistency with international obligations while considering customary rules and norms.
Robust institutions, including customary institutions, should support them.
There are a range of possible future scenarios for the use of wild species.
These confirm that climate change, increasing demand and technological advances, making many extractive practices more efficient, are likely to present significant challenges to sustainable use in the future.- IPS UN Bureau Report
Mechanization will change Africa’s agriculture sector
AGRICULTURE can fuel long-term economic growth and development.
Successful realisation of this promise calls for agricultural mechanisation to play a critical role in Africa, a region that suffers from food insecurity.
Indeed, mechanisation is a critical component of agricultural output that African nations have historically disregarded.
Increased mechanisation has been recognised as a means of increasing agricultural production, which is also one of the sustainable development goals (zero poverty and food security).
Agricultural mechanisation decreases drudgery, alleviates labour shortages, and improves agricultural output and timeliness.
Furthermore, using new eco-friendly technology allows farmers to grow crops more effectively while using less electricity.
Agricultural mechanisation also significantly helps the expansion of value chains and food systems by improving the efficiency of post-harvest, processing, and marketing operations.
Food security appears to be a possibility with greater technology, as mechanisation is a significant element impacting agricultural output. Increased mechanisation enhances actual food yield.
As a result, government investment in mechanisation becomes a priority in the quest for improved agricultural output.
Mechanisation must be included as an essential component of the innovation necessary to increase agricultural output.
Many nations on the continent are at the stage where additional land must be developed to meet increasing market requirements. The existing land must be more seriously developed, requiring more mechanisation per unit of land.
Therefore, making proper expenditures on mechanisation remains necessary. As a result, the importance of policies encouraging higher levels of investment in mechanisation cannot be overstated.
Successful mechanisation will be critical in addressing severe difficulties in the continent’s agricultural sector, such as skyrocketing food import costs and widespread rural unemployment.
Countries on the continent can leverage public-private partnerships to promote local machinery businesses and ensure the deployment of inexpensive and relevant technologies.
Incentivising the private sector to engage in mechanisation through tax breaks and appropriate subsidies is also critical for optimal agricultural returns.
Finally, because of breakthroughs in renewable energy and digital technology, Africa may bypass the stages of technological growth that other areas have had to go through, making its mechanisation process both quick and profitable.- Tech Farmer
