The participation of the youth in agriculture is important to unlock Africa’s development, food security and sustainability. This is the message that reverberated at the Tshwane University of Technology’s Future of Work 4IR Dialogue held in Pretoria this week.
Speaking on the second day of the conference, held under the theme “Collaboration for inclusive economic growth”, United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) resident representative and director for Africa Finance Sector Dr
Ayodele Odusola said Africa needed to adopt aggressive agricultural policies that were able to push the frontier of agricultural productivity.
“We need to increase technology, skills and provision systems … this is important to accelerate the kind of development that the youth would be interested in. Anything that is devoid of this is an indirect way of discouraging our youth to be part of agriculture,” he said.
“As we sit today, the average age of a farmer is 60 years. So, what kind of productivity do you expect from most of them, especially those who are not really educated?”
Now in its second year, the conference attracts business, government leaders, policy makers, international development organisations, academics and civil society to look at the skills that graduates need to be able to participate in the economy of the future.
Odusola also shared some startling figures in his presentation. Only about 6% of arid land in Africa is irri.gated. “This cannot take us anywhere,” he said.
“We need to enhance and improve infrastructure facilities, particularly in irrigation.”
It is a discussion that Tshwane University of Technology (TUT) final-year computer systems engineering student Ashley Maluleke has been looking forward to. Maluleke – who was one of the students taking visitors through some of the projects that the TUT’s Artificial Intelligence Hub is working on – has a keen interest in irrigation.
He is excited about the role of technology in improving agricultural productivity.
The fully automated greenhouse is one of the projects that are on display.
But Maluleke’s eyes light up when he talks about a project which would allow farmers to be able to remotely monitor and execute a number of activities, including irrigation. With the practical experiments he does as part of his studies and the projects of the hub, Maluleke waxes lyrical about the possibilities his chosen field of study opens up in the farming sector.
It is exactly this kind of energy that Odusola said the continent needs for sustainability and food security.
“Most African countries got carried away by wanting to have smart cities, which is a very good development too. But to do this at the expense of rural transformation and development is a mistake.
“Without rural transformation and development there cannot be transformative agriculture.
“Our youth do not want to stay in rural areas without electricity, water, good roads and communications systems. This is an indirect way of decapitalising the agricultural sector.”
He said agriculture has to be an integral part of rural development policies.
Head of the computer systems engineering department at TUT, Prof Pius Owalawi, told delegates that AI and modern technology provide many opportunities in the agricultural sector, especially for young people. “The challenge is whether we are ready for a job shift, that is, skilling, reskilling and upskilling,” he said.
“This year, we started a new programme with 30 student graduates from (fields such as) biochemistry, biology and statistics. We train them in cloud computing, data science and AI. Already 13 of them are in the process of getting international jobs,” he said.
“Last year I was given about 37 diploma graduates and we retrained. About 99% of them are now working with top companies.
“Tech is here to stay; we must embrace it positively so that African children can benefit,” he said.
Mahlaka Makgahlela, the research team manager for animal breeding and genetics at the Agricultural Research Council, lamented the fact that even agriculture-rich land in cities is used for industrial purposes.
