By Sylvia Juuko

The budget’s focus on roads has pleased donors.

“For the first time the Government is paying serious attention to roads,” EU delegation head Ambassador Vincent de Visscher said after the reading of the budget yesterday.

He praised the Government’s promise to raise its own resources adding: “That’s what the EU has been asking for.”

However, he said the budget was “poor for agriculture and rural development” and did not meet farmers’ expectations.

“The supply of 500 walking tractors is just a drop in the ocean,” he said.

He noted that while a substantial amount of money will be channelled through NAADS, it wasn’t clear how it would benefit farmers.

“To make meaningful change in the agriculture sector, the Government needs to triple the current allocation of funding.”

Danish Ambassador Stig Barlying said he was impressed that Uganda was moving away from heavy dependence on donors to domestic revenue.

He said he was also impressed by the 8.9% growth rate and by the promise to fight corruption.

“Financing the institutions that help in curbing corruption is a very welcome development.”

Cuban ambassador Mariano Lores said the budget was well-presented and very organised. He said the information that the economy was growing at such a high rate was good news.

On his part, the honourary consul general of Austria, Karl Wipfler, said: “This was the best budget in terms of focusing on critical areas for growth. We have not seen any ad hoc policies, which creates continuity.”

Industrialist James Mulwana commended the initiative to provide funding to agro-investments.

He noted that some of proposals from the private sector, such as supporting small and medium enterprises, had been addressed. He said this showed that the Government had respected the views collected during the consultation process.

Another businessman, Gordon Wavamunno, was equally upbeat. “The budget focus is reasonable as it strives to lower the cost of doing business.”

However, he urged the Government to cut down expenditure on consumption and do more to fight corruption.