The Zambia National Service (ZNS) is a strategic institution that has played a critical role in safeguarding the country, ensuring food security and youth skills training, among other activities.
During the UNIP government, ZNS was well known for spearheading food production in State farms and in training young people in various skills.
Although the performance of the State farms has in recent years gone down, ZNS has remained critical in bolstering agriculture production.
In the previous Patriotic Front (PF) government, the Rural Roads Unit (RRU), which used to be under the Ministry of Works and Supply, was moved to the Ministry of Defence under ZNS to supplement the Link Zambia 8,000 as well as the Pave Zambia 2,000 roads projects.
This was aimed at ensuring that ZNS becomes instrumental in opening up feeder roads that were important in connecting farmers and production areas in remote villages to markets in towns and cities to increase agriculture production.
Yesterday, President Hakainde Hichilema pledged to secure funding to enable ZNS establish more training schools and skills development centres across the country.
Mr Hichilema said this when he graced the pass out of 290 officer cadets who comprised 184 males and 106 females at the ZNS military training school in Kafue.
The President’s commitment is important given that ZNS has always demonstrated capacity to deliver skills training as well as improve Zambia’s food production.
Early this week, ZNS unveiled its fish farming programme in Chanyanya, which is bound to be the biggest aquaculture project in the region.
The ZNS command embarked on the fish restocking exercise at Chanyanya Fish Camp in Kafue district where 246,000 fingerlings have been restocked in three ponds.
According to ZNS Commandant Lieutenant General Maliti Solochi, the
fish restocking programme follows a directive by President Hichilema that the fishing camp be revamped after 15 years of being dormant.
The fish farm, which will be the largest in the SADC region, will also host training programmes for ZNS staff to make the project a success.
With the New Dawn Government being keen on investing in the youth to increase chances of creating jobs, skills development and entrepreneurship, President Hichilema is counting on ZNS to establish more training schools and skills development centres across the country.
This is not the first time ZNS is being given the task of training youths.
Successive governments have in the past turned to ZNS to try and reduce the number of youths who end up on the streets by boosting opportunities for them to be trained in ZNS camps.
With more youths being trained, Zambia will have more young entrepreneurs who will drive production and job creation especially in agriculture using ZNS skills training.
In addition to that, the number of female cadets who passed out in Kafue is yet another encouraging indication that more women are taking interest in serving the country.
This is an encouraging path that Zambia should take as it continues to move forward.