Stryker Motlaloso
2 August 2005
A study has blamed the public service in Botswana for government's failure to create employment, attract foreign direct investment and the slow growth of the economy. The Botswana Confederation of Commerce, Industry and Manpower (BOCCIM) study acknowledges that though the country has made strides in the political, social and economic levels, unemployment remains "unacceptably high, and the economy is very narrowly based".
The study points out that other countries such as Mauritius that followed a development path similar to that of Botswana have either low or relative unemployment levels. Such countries have no poverty and no threats to economic confidence like Botswana. The BOCCIM study argues that the Botswana economy is besieged because when the diamond-led economy generated funds, the government set up a structure to distribute the narrowly generated wealth for the benefit of the entire society. Moreover, government used a model of state structures to distribute wealth rather than providing incentives, or concentrating its funds on creating an enabling structure for wealth creation by a well-diversified business sector.
"In doing so, government chose a model otherwise labelled the African, which generally puts socio-political considerations to economic ones. The result: a large civil service being interposed, more or less like a sponge, between the primary income generator (mining) and the rest of the business sector," the report reads in part.
The negative results of the model, the report states are business unfriendly regulation, mismatches between education system and the requirements of an entrepreneurial economy. Other negative attributes are occasional obstructive behaviour common to large bureaucracies, says the report.
"The set-up produces poor quality GDP growth: in National Product calculation, the spending by general government (including civil service salaries) equates with production. This leads to apparent differences between GDP size and growth performance on paper, and what is seen in reality in terms of economic performance and employment generation outside the public sector. Hence if a civil service is not very small, and very efficient, it acts less as a producer and more as a sponge- and GDP is effectively overstated," says the report.
At another level, the report says that where government is large, it can become the main bottleneck in areas such as creating employment and it may absorb potentially productive funds and in some cases deploy such funds inefficiently.
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2005 Mmegi/The Reporter. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
