Dylan Mukoroli

Namibia is currently going through its most enduring and soaring economic downturn. For an economy with very little economic muscle, this puts us under much greater vulnerability. 

In the same vein, everything seems to be blamed on the first citizen when things go wrong. We seem to forget that our economy consists of a whole network of individuals, lobbyists, industries and economic stakeholders that have equal roles. All the above mentioned play an intricate role in the ensuring of sustainability, groundwork and theoretical framework of our economy. 

The current administration is thus pulling out all the stops to mitigate and provide interventions. It thus serves a real and authentic purpose to brand the current economic mitigation, looming economic recovery plan and interventions as “Hagenomics”. 

Having listened to the first citizen on many occasions and having themed most of his discussions. He places emphasis on three important parallels to building an inclusive Namibian house and a people-centred abstract to turning our economy around. These three important parallels are processes, systems and institutions. The first citizen alludes to the notion that the workable mandate of these three parallels speaks to inclusivity and shared prosperity. Let’s now unpack these three parallels. 

What does the President refer to when he speaks of processes? What is involved? What kind of thinking must we have to play part in this process parallel? government in its totality cannot act revolutionary, it cannot act without measure and accountability. There are processes that are in place that guides what needs to be done. One can say that processes slow down or create bureaucracy, but only those that do not speak to the context of a country, to what a country can handle. Hagenomics seeks to shake up processes that create bottleneck scenarios. In this regard, especially when looking at service delivery, processes are important. 

Processes give us improved service delivery agility. 
Service delivery forms the foundational framework of a government. Hagenomics seeks to rid delays and looks towards processes that are grounded in theory and ethnographic. Government must have the ability to react to change. The change we refer to here is the fourth industrial revolution, education for social change and lifelong learning. These changes stem from commitments and advancements in better service delivery

Increased efficiency as
 a result of systems
Government has always had a challenge of making their service delivery processes function more smoothly and efficiently. Inefficient processes waste valuable time and money but are often difficult to identify and hard to change. This concern has finally met its match named Hagenomics. Hagenomics seeks to implement systems that promote tangible practices and observations that root out inefficiencies. All these in the form of service delivery practices.  
As a result of Hagenomics systems, service delivery practices are designed to pinpoint these inefficiencies and to eliminate the slowdowns they create. 

Service delivery practices allow duty bearers a greater understanding of each step of the development process. 
This enhanced knowledge can lead to new process solutions that avoid the bottlenecking of services and other inessential redundancies in government. Ideally, service delivery practices can help determine how the process might work under optimal conditions, allowing government to alter the process with that goal in mind. 
All this sounds technical, but in layman’s words, it unpacks how and why it is needed to have planned, tried and tested systems in place when looking to get things done. 

Institutions as an economic turnaround strategy
It is tough to deliberate on the fundamental constituents of a functioning society and economy when you are hungry. And it is even harder to believe in the importance of these institutions when the same society or economy has failed to provide you with an education, or a job, or the means with which to feed your family. Hagenomics on the back of the Namibia Economic Summit proposed a blueprint for job creation and economic growth. Having coded and themed the event, one key strong and tangible modality is to strengthen institutions such as public enterprises. Public enterprises give government a share of the Namibian economy. 

There exists a wide range of public institutions that support our society, incorporating structures that defend property rights and the legal and economic framework, including the political system within which government operates; institutions which regulate economic and financial stability; and those that provide social insurance and safeguard security. As such, these institutions make up the fabric within which citizens, businesses, political parties and the economy operate, and provide a framework of rules, social norms and understanding processes that are both explicit and implicit. These are the tenets upon which Hagenomics seeks to promote inclusivity and shared prosperity. Many might feel that these institutions do not work for them, this is a concern that still hampers inclusivity. We thus call on Hagenomics to dig deeper in providing literacy with regards to access to these institutions and their functionality. 

We learn from Hagenomics that State institutions are an economy’s primary facilitator of social and economic development. Research shows that these institutions can be a pivotal source of progression; effective institutions aid investment in physical and human capital, in research and development, and in technology. We further learn from Hagenomics that institutions also have an important redistributive role to play in the economy – they make sure that resources are properly allocated, and ensure that the poor or those with fewer economic resources are protected. This speaks to the shared prosperity nature of Hagenomics. They also encourage trust by providing policing and justice systems, which adhere to a common set of laws. Properly functioning institutions are a signal of a well-managed economy, enabling governments – and businesses – to borrow money more cheaply to fund priority projects. In turn, higher growth and lower borrowing costs give governments the resources to spend on social needs as well as on investment into infrastructure, health and education. These are some of the grounded theories and modalities that Hagenomics presents to us.