Botswana plans to diversify its economy, investing in science, tech and entrepreneurship to lessen a dependency on diamond mining.
Botswana plans to diversify its economy, investing in science, tech and entrepreneurship to lessen a dependency on diamond miningCommercial buildings stand in the central business district of Gaborone. Picture: BLOOMBERG/WALDO SWIEGERS
Phatsima is just one part of a nationwide push to diversify Botswana’s economy, investing in science, tech and entrepreneurship to lessen a dependency on diamond mining. Mining remains the biggest revenue earner for this sparsely populated southern African country, accounting for just under 20% of total GDP.
With high levels of inequality, an unemployment rate of 24.5% and a population of just over 2-million, the Batswana are eagerly launching initiatives from e-learning to online markets, all while navigating funding challenges in the Covid-19 era.Phatsima operates out of the Botswana Digital and Innovation Hub, launched in 2014 to create a generation of start-ups by huddling all sorts of tech entrepreneurs together in one industrial park.
More recently they have introduced a backpack with a built-in solar panel that charges as students walk to school, allowing them to plug in devices or light sources at home. “If I find you stuck and you don’t have petrol, and then I see somebody starving, whom do I start with? Naturally, I will start to feed somebody to survive then come back to you and say OK, now I can help you too,” said Letsholathebe.
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