The Sweet Fruits of Agribusiness

Thousands of youths after graduating from the university start hunting for white collar jobs from office to office with papers in their hands. This is because they consider such jobs to be well paying and secure enough since one is sure to receive a salary at the end of each month.

That was the same case with Ivanna, who went around tarmacking after graduating with a Bachelor’s Degree in law, from one of the renowned law schools in the country. He had all the confidence that he was ripe enough to be employed as a lawyer.

Little did Ivanna know that the number of people who have graduated from different universities in the country is very high yet employment opportunies are just for very few. Most of the offices that he visited, he was told to leave behind his papers and promised to be contacted for an interview.

He did that for almost a year and he gave up since none of the people who had promised to call him back fulfilled their promises. Ivanna thought to himself how he would make ends meet since life was beginning to be more tough than he had thought before. His parents were not in a position to support him fully since he still had five younger siblings who were still in school.

The young man decided to move back to the village where his parents resided so that he could help them with farm work as he waited for his dream job. His father practiced maize and wheat farming on their 10-acre farm. Farming was his father’s source of income since he had no other job.

Since he had been helping his dad with farm work since he was a liitle kid, he had enough knowledge on farming and therefore, he asked his father for an acre of land where he wanted to plant vegetables.

Little did Ivana know that agribusiness was going to be his stepping stone in life. He decided to venture into vegetable farming, tomatoes and passion fruit farming. When starting off, it was not that easy but four years down the line, he falls among young successful farmers in his county.

After getting enough money from the portion of land that his father gave him, he decided to buy himself another 5-acres so as to expound on his agribusiness. He also decided to venture into horticulture farming and fishing.

He attributes his success to his father who had natured him into farming activities. He even helps his parents in educating his siblings. the now successful graduate and farmer advises his fellow youth who are out there desperately looking for white collar jobs to consider self-employment. He states that it does not necessarily supposed to be farming but any income generating activities like buying and selling of cereals, dairy farming, poultry keeping and even starting your own company.

Article by Vera Shawiza.