Gov. Abiola Ajimobi of Oyo State

By Gbenro Adesina/Ibadan

The Oyo State Government disclosed at the weekend that both the public and private sectors as well as communities would be adequately mobilized and empowered as partners to make patriotic contributions to the state especially in the areas of revenue generation and development process.

It stated that strategies for revenue generation would be deployed based on its peculiarities and unique strengths for development, noting that there would be institutional framework for economic planning, budgeting and development that would coordinate sectoral strategies across Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) which will serve as a pre-requisite for attracting resources from multilateral/bilateral development partners as well as direct foreign investors.

These were part of the recommendations made at the end of a 3-day Workshop on Institutional Reforms themed ‘DEVELOPMENT PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT COOPERATION: VEHICLE FOR SOCIO-ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT IN OYO STATE’ organized by the State government at the House of Chiefs, State Secretariat, Ibadan.

The workshop, which had top government functionaries in attendance, was facilitated by a team of resource persons led by a Development Cooperation Expert, Dr. Yisa Kolawole, was in line with the principle of the state’s budget of self-reliance.

It was noted at the workshop that the financial grants, technical aid as well as concessional facilities by Development Partners are readily available but sub-optimally harnessed by the Oyo State Government.

In her remarks, the Host and Special Adviser to Governor Abiola Ajimobi on Intervention funds and Developmental Projects, Dr. Adebukola Adebusoye, pledged that government would continue to advocate and promote the culture of value chain, especially towards agribusiness activities to enhance revenue base, noting that a combination of strategies for improved tax and non-tax revenues is important for equity in the system.

She assured that Ajimobi administration will work towards achieving a reliable database which will be adopted as a reference platform at all times, stressing that reliable data base will aid the intervention projects, programmes and initiative of the Development partners to expand the frontiers of opportunity/cooperation required for the socio-economic development of the state.

Dr. Adebusuyi stated that the 3-day workshop was organized to create awareness on the new paradigm in development planning and international cooperation as a cost effective/feasible option for economic growth and development.

“We want to sensitize key actors on the imperative for institutional capacity/reforms to sustainably attract development grants, technical aid or concessionary loans required to facilitate the development aspirations of Oyo State. This workshop is also to expose participants to new concepts and principles in development planning and international cooperation for broad based options in policy making as well as to review practices and learn from experiences of best practices,” she explained.

Dr. Adebusuyi further revealed that the workshop was not going to be a one-off programme, saying that the government had lined-up more of such workshops in order to involve all stake-holders in the implementation and workability of all government’s policies and reforms with a view to create socio-economic growth in the state.