Addis Ababa, February 15, 2006 -
Deputy Prime Minister Addisu Legese said the country has attached due attention
particularly to good quality and competitive products in a bid to boost
productivity over the coming five years.
In an exclusive interview he gave to the Ethiopian
Television on Tuesday, Addisu Legesse, who is also Minister of Agriculture and
Rural Development, said the country is undertaking wide-ranging activities to
attain the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
He said various measures would be taken to tackle
implementation problems observed in the agriculture sector.
Addisu said the government has designed a
five-year economic and social development strategy in order to register ten
percent annual economic growth.
According to Addisu, the nation is witnessing a
steady socio-economic growth year after year.
He said encouraging results have been achieved
through the agriculture-led industrial development policy that gave due
attention to ecology- and export-oriented activities.
Efforts would be deployed in the coming five years
to build on the already registered results and bring about swift growth in the
agriculture sector, Addisu said.
Addisu underscored the need to boost productivity
and keep the quality of harvests, adding that technology packages would be
subsequently expanded to boost productivity.
To that effect, Addisu said, efforts would be
exerted to identify high-yielding areas and pursue market-oriented harvest
system.
Addisu also underlined the need to augment the
link between agriculture and industry.
Addisu said the five-year sustainable economic and
social development plan was designed in such a way that it would help meet the
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
He said wrong attitudes had been observed among
farmers, professionals and the public due to lack of awareness, adding that
successive meetings would be held with all stakeholders to alleviate the
problems.
Addisu said wide-ranging activities on
construction of infrastructure facilities, reaching out more agriculture package
beneficiaries and scaling up provision of select seed and fertilizers would be
implemented to be more effective in the agriculture sector.
Source: ENA
