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Ministry of Commerce and Industry of Rwanda, Director General of Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation, Jonas Munyurangabo
Botswana is weak in policy monitoring and evaluation and overly advisory, making policy implementation difficult. The national consultant of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) for Botswana, Montle Phuthego, made this observation at the UNCTAD conference during the presentation of the lessons learned by Botswana from the institutional arrangements for the formulation, implementation and coordination of policies in the field of economic diversification (ESD). and Citizen Economic Empowerment (CES) policies.
Phuthego said Botswana has a reputation for proposing good policies that have been thoroughly thought through, but the biggest challenge is always to apply the same principles. She added that another weakness was the lack of monitoring and evaluation of policies, a situation that often leads to failure in achieving defined goals and objectives.
Phuthego gave the example of the Economic Diversification Campaign (ESD), pointing out that when formulating the policy, the working group did not take into account the local content of the manufactured products, which left a loophole for the local population to provide products from outside the country. She added that "briefcases" purchased products from companies outside the country and provided services to departments, the largest business provider in the country. This is also detrimental to the growth of the local manufacturing sector, which has failed to develop under ESD.
Phuthego cited another political failure, namely protectionist strategies, in which governments create an environment conducive to the growth of local businesses by giving them preference over foreign firms. She added that while coming from a good place to facilitate the growth of local SMEs and its contribution to the diversification of the economy, protectionist strategies have instead led to non-competitive behavior. "Sometimes local companies have been supplying poor quality products at very high prices to the government," she said, explaining that this has led to a decline in private sector service provision.
For his part, Jonas Munyurangabo, Director General of Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation of Rwanda's Ministry of Trade and Industry, said that performance-based monitoring helps move the agenda forward. things. He proposed a solution to the difficulties encountered by Botswana in implementing and monitoring some policies cited by Phuthego.
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