If you are a young Namibian farmer, or you want to be one, then Windhoek is the place to be from to 22-25 March next year.
Symposium organiser and registered Boerbok and Van Rooi breeder, as well as commercial beef and dry field crop producer Vipua Muharukua, who farms in the district of Outjo in the Kunene region, said they expect the symposium to bring together 200 to 300 young farmers in the country.
“We hope to draw small stock farmers, irrigation crop farmers, dry field poultry farmers, large stock farmers and pig farmers, be it commercial, communal or resettled farmers. We hope to have farmers from the south, north, east and west of the country. The only criteria is that one be a farmer,” said Muharukua, who’s also a member of parliament (MP).
“What we hope to achieve through this idea is to provide various talks with various experiences in various fields. We hope to devote a day for brainstorming and resolving on directions that we as young farmers would like to see our farming take, and where our government should assist us in using our energy, infinity and ethnology to enhance our farming,” he added.
The symposium is a young farmers’ event, and eventually the farmers’ voice.
“Organisers cannot decide what is important to provide for discussion and talks. So, this platform serves as a consultative one where young farmers will share ideas on questions that will be shared for opinions to be considered to help the organisers cater for the needs of the young farmer at the symposium,” he explained to participants in a WhatsApp group he set up ahead of the seminar as a preparatory platform.
In the context of Namibia, Muharukua said the young farmer is deemed to be between the ages of 0 and 55. Therefore, the symposium will be strictly for those in those categories.
WhatsApp is not only limited to young farmers, and everyone is welcome as there is a need for their input in organising and arranging the symposium.
According to Muharukua, the symposium’s organisers have a number of goals and benchmarks they hope to accomplish on the way to empowering young farmers. “We have one overarching vision: Liquidity. As farmers, we want to make sure we do make money, and lots of it in this sector. We want to make sure young farmers get used to constant money flow from agricultural ventures,” he enthused.
What the youth expect from the symposium
Khaibasen Garden Project farmers at Ganamab’s Jimmy Araseb said he expects the symposium to establish a legal and recognised body that will directly address the issues of farmers, such as fair competition with already-established foreign companies, access to farming land, and relaxed and low interest loans.
“I also expect the symposium to address issues of information and skills development, and the hosting of annual capacity-building programmes and conferences on the producing and processing of raw materials into finished products to the point of selling. Financial literacy and farming methods are others,” he added.
He said the symposium should also establish a body that will lobby funding for start-ups and existing farmers to either establish farms or expand already- existing farms, the procurement of advanced machinery, processing plants and irrigation equipment.
“This conference should further establish a body that will monitor school gardens through the education ministry – for all the schools in the country that offer agriculture as a subject to establish school gardens as a regulation in order to ignite awareness on the importance of agriculture to our country from a young age,” Araseb noted.
Linus Kamati, who farms near Schlip in the Hardap region as a Boerbok stud breeder and the owner of Kanaams Oos Boerboek Stoet, said he hopes to build on his network with fellow farmers, and get to share agricultural knowledge and experiences there.