Progressive Kenyans must by now have realised that something should urgently be done to address the current youth unemployment.
We are sitting on a time bomb and soon, the country may pay dearly. Agriculture as an industry is capable of absorbing the large youth population directly and indirectly.
The country's population is growing at an unprecedented rate yet we bury our heads in the sand like the proverbial ostrich. How can we explain the situation where politicians can mobilise youth any day of the week and they immediately avail themselves in large numbers? This scenario should spur any progressive society to immediate action.
One of the solutions would be to make agriculture a compulsory subject in both primary and secondary schools. How can a country that is heavily depended on agriculture relegate such an important subject into the periphery and celebrate other subjects such as Kiswahili and English?
We know that even our national flag embodies Agriculture yet we haven't placed this all important subject in the right position.
The current massive rural-urban migration can easily be mitigated when the youth appreciate that agriculture is central in wealth creation. My mother used to say that, "Wealth resides in the soil" and therefore no one should despise farming. If agriculture is made central in young people's lives, unemployment will definitely be resolved. The lie that farming is not cool must be debunked. Agriculture and its related chain has fed generations world over.
Thomas Jefferson a founding father of America once said: "Agriculture is the wisest pursuit, because it will in the end contribute most to real wealth, good morals and happiness."
