Opinion: Agriculture's Response to Climate Change Effects Will Determine Future Income Levels
Uganda’s Minister of State for Agriculture, Christopher Kibanzanga has warned that the attainment of the middle income status by 2020 will depend on the extent at which the country will be able to lift a majority of her population who depend on agriculture from the current dominant traditional methods of farming.
“We are only remaining with 4 years to 2020, a year which the president said he wants to see Ugandans migrate to middle income status, but with the current form of technology being applied in agriculture especially by farmers is worrying and we may miss that economic target unless we commercialize biotechnology application in the sector,” said Kibanzanga.
Kibanzanga sounded the warning during the Launch of the 20th Anniversary report on commercialization of Biotechnology crops which was held in Kampala recently.
He said a majority of the country’s population depends on the agriculture whose Gross Domestic Product contribution to the country’s economy is declining because of soil infertility, land fragmentation among other catastrophes related to climate change.
Rod Waddington