Kae Matundu-Tjiparuro
Northern farmers turn to meat processing to boost profits. This headline of a local English daily this week could not but catch Yours Truly Ideologically’s attention. As it indeed should, must and may have caught the attention of many Namibians, especially communal farmers. Because local processing cut to the bone of the Namibian government’s value-addition song, almost elevating such to the status of another national anthem. The headline, as is self-explanatory, is about the initiative of Lesha Investment, a wholly Namibian-owned company owned by Joan Pohamba.
“I as a citizen of Namibia, hereby pledge as an individual and collectively that I will endeavour to uplift the standard of living by all means humanly possible by employing my abilities and capabilities and help others where I can and contribute to the development of my country, Namibia,” reads a pledge in the Sixth National Development (NDP6). Kudos indeed to Pohamba for starting to fulfil her pledge by venturing into helping the country’s exploited farmers. Helping them to get the best of their farming in a vicious and predatory capitalist system by teaching them to process meat and thus diversify their farming activities. Given that currently farming to them only entails selling live animals. In view of the status quo where and when the country is exporting 65% of her livestock on the hoof while only eight per cent (8%) is processed locally. With the minimal processing, it is currently uncertain if it is done in the communal areas at all. The said pledge as encapsulated in NDP6 is meant for all, not only to embrace but also, it goes without saying, to apply. But and a BIG BUT and question is whether local processing in itself and alone is the answer. Answer to the current status where capitalism is reigning and ruling supreme. Despite the politically hegemonic notion of Namibia being a mixed economy, whatever this means. With capitalism dominating production in Namibia, if indeed it is not the sole mode of production in the country, it is unimaginable what it is mixed with if not purely raw capitalism with its usual doses of handouts, in the case of Namibia what is referred to as social safety nets. The end result thereof is to make capitalism acceptable and the exploitation and suffering of the wretched masses bearable.
The negative effects of lack of local processing are numerous. In the first instance there are no ancillary industries and their chain effects, like additional job creation. Additional job creation avenues beyond the traditional, where people have to go job hunting as opposed to creating jobs for themselves, are a sine qua non. Which is what Pohamba has been endeavouring towards. For the creation of livelihood chains as opposed to economic chains, lest this be interpreted in the capitalist system. Where any prosperity is not a natural outcome and/or development but a capitalist pull and push. Because Yours Truly Ideologically cannot but ask what the ultimate use of local processing is under the current capitalist production system and what it should and must be, besides the amassing of profits. Indeed, profit seems to be the premise of Pohamba. As opposed to self-reliance and self-sufficiency, of a part for that matter, the few selected and usual clique of comprador bourgeoisie, but the whole. More so the currently exploited, who continue to be exploited despite the gains of political independence.
Among the marginalised in Namibia, needless to mention, are the farmers, especially in the communal areas. Referring to them as marginalised is indeed a misnomer because they are simply exploited. In the case of livestock rearing, they are the foremost producers but essentially do not own their products, which are livestock, as they do not determine the price thereof. Instead of being owners of the products of their toiling, they are instead just like all workers, eventually alienated from their products that they even cannot be said to be selling but merely conduits to and of the vicious capitalist livestock market and its predators, the middle people, the so-called auctioneers.
Earlier this week, the Omaheke governor was on one of the channels of the national broadcaster, the Namibian Broadcasting Corporation (NBC), expounding his vision and plans for local processing of agricultural products. In vogue with Namibia’s eighth administration, which has agriculture as one of its main pillars of the seven. Especially in view of the fact that his region is one of the main producers of cattle in the country, if not the main. But with little local processing. In this regard he could not hide his joy at finding, at this year’s Windhoek Agricultural and Industrial Show, fellow inhabitants from a resettlement farm in the region showing and selling products made from cow hides. Equally, a group of women from a self-help project in the Otjinene Constituency could not but evoke a sense of pride in him. An indication that slowly but surely at last Omaheke is taking the small starting leap towards local processing and eventually industrialisation.
Perhaps not in the same fashion as in capitalism, but by the people doing something for themselves, foremost for self-sustenance and self-reliance. As much as wealth creation is among the goals in NDP6, it is uncertain what it may mean in the context of capitalism. If one is to especially dare speak about the equal distribution of natural resources, economic equality, and what it may also mean as well as prosperity. Such in capitalism may not mean the same thing as in a production system where profit is not the main and guiding motive, as well as the push and pull factors. These surely are matters which cannot be taken on face value and on their rhetorical essence as espoused by politicians but interrogated as to their ideological genesis other than from purely a developmental perspective in which too often they are coughed in and ascribed and subscribed to.
