The economy must work for all Ugandans, says Ggoobi

The Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Finance, Mr Ramathan Ggoobi, has said the government is working to transform the economy to ensure that it works for all Ugandans.

He said the recent study at the Growth Lab at Havard University showed that Uganda’s economy in the last 15 years has added 24 new products on its export basket.

The PSST said this means that Uganda does not only rely on traditional commodities like coffee to earn foreign exchange. Apart from gold, tea, cotton, coffee, maize, among others, Uganda now has manufactured products as exports ( electronics,IT,agricultural inputs,chemicals for production etc).

He said the government has decided to deliberately pursue ATMS- agro-industrialization, tourism development, mineral based industrial development including oil and gas as well as science, technology and innovation including ICT.

Ggoobi said their job is to make the economy more broad-based so that it can work for the majority of the people, adding that the macro numbers must work for the macro numbers to make sense.

The PSST said the economy cannot work for the people if it’s not growing, if inflation is rising, if there are no exports to earn money or if the value of the currency is deteriorating.

“All Ugandans must start thinking like economists,” he said.

Ggoobi said the Parish Development Model was put in place to ensure every Ugandan outside the money economy  starts doing something.

He said the fundamental binding constraint for Uganda is capital and many young people and adults have ideas on how to make their lives better but they don’t have capital.

The PSST said out of the money sent for PDM to the beneficiaries 37% ( about 2 trillion) has gone into high-value crops,26% has gone into poultry, and the other money has gone into piggery, coffee and fruits.

Ggoobi  also acknowledged the challenge of unemployment especially for the youth but added that Gov’t is working to create jobs through interventions such as setting up industrial parks.

He reiterated that the agenda of the government is wealth creation and the national budget for next FY 2025/26 is targeting more resources on getting ATMS funded to work for Ugandans.

The other enablers being targeted for funding are peace and security, roads and railways including SGR, electricity transmission, irrigation, disaster management and providing more money for UDB, UDC, PDM and Emyooga.