Economy
The economy of the province is highly rooted in agriculture. According to some estimates, more than 80% of the rural population depends solely on agriculture, including a strong livestock sub-sector. Food crops include rice (planted mostly in the Ndop Plain), potatoes (found in the Bui Division and Santa in Mezam Division), and beans (from most of the province). Maize, beans, potatoes, plantains, cocoyams, cassava and yams are the main food staples for the region. Cocoyams is used for making Achu, a staple for the Ngemba people and a widely consumed delicacy across the country. A lot of groundnuts is produced in the North-West, most of it from Esimbi. The province is also a major palm wine producer with one of its towns Batibo being the palm wine capital for Cameroon. The wine produced from Batibo though distributed across the country on a daily basis, still lacks the infrastructure and technology to produce on an industrial scale.
Industry plays a very small role in the economy of the North-West province, in terms of both the number of industries and the number of people employed. Except for soap production, the rest are agricultural processing businesses. Local crafts also flourish in some parts of the province with the production of various works of arts from wood, some weaving, and pottery. Fabrication of agricultural tools was once a booming sector but is now less significant.
Read more about this topic: Northwest Region (Cameroon)
Famous quotes containing the word economy:
“Quidquid luce fuit tenebris agit: but also the other way around. What we experience in dreams, so long as we experience it frequently, is in the end just as much a part of the total economy of our soul as anything we “really” experience: because of it we are richer or poorer, are sensitive to one need more or less, and are eventually guided a little by our dream-habits in broad daylight and even in the most cheerful moments occupying our waking spirit.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“The basis of political economy is non-interference. The only safe rule is found in the self-adjusting meter of demand and supply. Do not legislate. Meddle, and you snap the sinews with your sumptuary laws.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I favor the policy of economy, not because I wish to save money, but because I wish to save people. The men and women of this country who toil are the ones who bear the cost of the Government. Every dollar that we carelessly waste means that their life will be so much the more meager. Every dollar that we prudently save means that their life will be so much the more abundant. Economy is idealism in its most practical terms.”
—Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)