Farmers outline factors that hinder their development

Farmers outline factors that hinder their development

Tuesday, 13 December 2011 21:49

By Frank Aman The Citizen Correspondent Dar es Salaam. Lack of direct marketing, contract farming and poor participation of private sectors in agriculture sector have been cited as major challenges that hindering the fight of small farmers against poverty and development of the sector. Despite various initiatives that have been established by the government such as the Kilimo Kwanza (green revolution) initiative small farmers have not yet realized the potential of the sector.In addition the lack of accountability of local and district councils on managing funds allocated for agriculture initiatives and limited resources are other factors for the poor performance of the agriculture sector. Speaking during at a tour of the ministry of Agriculture, Food and Corporation yesterday the Vice chairman of the network of small farmers associations in Tanzania (MVIWATA) Veronica Sophu said the strategic plans of the government on agriculture do not help small farmers in the grassroots levels  “Beneficiaries of agricultural initiatives are rich people who have taken away land from peasants who do benefit from any initiatives,” she said. She said the government must realise that the development of agriculture should focus on small scale farmers.On his part, the director of policy and planning in the ministry Emmanuel Achayo said that in a bid to improve this sector and fighting against poverty in the country the growth of the sector need to be improved from four per cent to six per cent. He said that the government intends to increase its budget for agriculture sector from 6 per cent to reach 10 percent of the national budget to in future.“We understand that the agriculture sector faces various challenges the biggest being limited resources. That is why the government plans to extend its allocation so that it may improve the sector,” he said. from  http://www.thecitizen.co.tz/business/13-local-business/17924-farmers-outline-factors-that-hinder-their-development.html

Where does Tanzania miss a point in agricultural interventions?

Where does Tanzania miss a point in agricultural interventions?

Thursday, 08 December 2011 12:12

One of the areas of misconception in agriculture in Tanzania is the failure to recognise that agriculture is not a permanent economic activity. Agriculture is a transition occupation towards more stable occupations. As such good strategies put forward to develop the sector should aim at speeding up the process of people leaving the agricultural sector. Unfortunately most agricultural strategies in Tanzania and many other developing countries seem to aim at sustaining life in agriculture by making life bearable for the farming communities. Consider a multi billion project providing one or two chicken for a couple of families, or a goat, or construction of a small assembly market, or a small control dam to irrigate 15-20 acres, or just supplying tap water. These cannot bring any meaningful transformation of rural livelihoods. In short most agricultural interventions in Tanzania are not ambitious. The goals set can be easily achieved without any aggressiveness. I do not think if our partners in the west developed their countries by having such simple goals. The Netherlands wouldn’t have expanded their country by one-third by pushing sea water away. Europe wouldn’t have built the highways and construct water canals we see today. That’s why we benchmark with poor performers in our development plans and analysis. Learning from success stories, transforming agriculture should not take more than 20 years. For Tanzania it is now going to beyond 50 years. Europe after World War II was facing more or less similar problems Tanzania is facing; food shortage was a common problem. They decided to solve this problem once and for all.  Within 15 years food shortage became a thing of the past. Another example is Mexico and India. In Mexico the Green Revolution started in 1943. By then Mexico was importing half its wheat; in 1956, the Green Revolution had made Mexico self-sufficient in wheat; by 1964, Mexico was already exporting half a million tons of wheat. Similarly, in India famine was once accepted as inevitable; in 1961 the country was on the brink of mass famine and began its own Green Revolution programs. By then rice yields were about 2 tons per hectare. By mid-1990s, the yields had risen to six tons per hectare and India became one of the world’s most successful rice producers, and is now a major rice exporter, shipping nearly 4.5 million tons in 2006. The second oversight is that agricultural interventions are not focussed. They try to address almost all the crops in the country. Fortunately or unfortunately, by virtue of its location (0 - 2,000 m above sea level), Tanzania can produce almost all types of crops under the sun, both temperate and tropical ones and can support livestock of almost all species. Tanzania can produce cabbage, carrot, paprika, coffee, cotton, vanilla, pepper, cardamom,oranges, maize, wheat, clove, etc. Instead of this being a blessing, it is turning out to be a curse. The interventions by government attempt to address all these, but resources are always meagre to meet that desire. As a result, interventions tend to spread thinly with no significant impact on the ground. Countries that are located in semi arid areas such Egypt and Israel have managed to transform their agriculture because they focus resources on a few crops that they can produce better using small amount of water at their disposal. Egypt, depending on River Nile alone, can produce and export surplus wheat and rice. Israel produces and export a variety of fruits by utilising water tapped from Galilee Sea. For that matter, intervention by the government need to be focussed on a few carefully selected crops. from  http://thecitizen.co.tz/magazines/31-business-week/17742-where-does-tanzania-miss-a-point-in-agricultural-interventions.html

SAGCOT Invites New Members

Friday, 09 December 2011 04:59

Private companies and farmers’ groups have recently been invited to join the Southern Agriculture Growth Corridor of Tanzania (SAGCOT) in order to access the center’s financing and technological skills and to take advantage of the experience of the current SAGCOT members. According to the Chief Executive Officer of SAGCOT, Dustan Mrutu, who recently spoke at a stakeholders workshop for the Agriculture Council of Tanzania (ACT), the SAGCOT center helps to organize the government, private sector, farmers’ associations, development partners and nongovernmental organizations. “SAGCOT targets smallholder farmers, not big commercial farmers,” said Mr. Mrutu, “it’s not business as usual at the center because we are doing things differently.” Mr. Mrutu went on to emphasize that, while the ultimate goal will be to cover the whole country, the center is currently targeting the bread basket regions of the southern highlands based on the solid infrastructure that is already in place within the region. “Later on we will have Mtwara corridor, central corridor covering Dodoma and Singida regions until the whole country is covered,” explained Mr. Mrutu. The Chief Executive Officer further explained that the goal of this initiative is to improve the overall productivity of the Tanzania agriculture sector as well as the agro-processing and the manufacturing of finished goods from agriculture commodities. According to Salum Shamte, who currently serves as both SAGCOT Board Chairman and ACT Chairman, the numerous taxes that farmers pay to both the local and central government are sentencing rural farmers to complete poverty. “We as farmers pay at least 17 different taxes which are too much by any standard,” explained Mr. Shamte. Mr. Shamte went on to argue that agriculture is suffering from inflated interest rates charged by banks on loans, poor extension services and a hostile tax regime, the sector constitutes a single largest family of private investors in the country’s economy. “The private sector has a key role to play in the country’s economy and the largest single contributor to the GDP (gross domestic product) is agriculture which has a big number of private farmers,” he pointed out. SAGCOT is currently responsible for the implementation of the Comprehensive African Agriculture Development Program (CAADP), a program that is backed by a World Bank hosted Trust Fund in an effort to eliminate hunger and reduce poverty through agriculture. In a joint effort by African governments through CAADP funding, public investment in agriculture will be increased by a minimum of 10 percent of their respective national budgets and agricultural productivity will be increased by at least 6 percent per annum. The Tanzania agriculture sector contributes to approximately 30 percent of the country’s GDP, more that 40 percent of the foreign currency earning and employs more than 70 percent of rural farmers in addition to meeting almost 100 percent of the food needs of the country’s estimated 44 million people. from http://www.tanzaniainvest.com/tanzania-agriculture/tanzania-agriculture-news/438-sagcot-invites-new-members

PLANS ARE GOD’S IDEAS

REFERENCES

Ø PROVERB 16:1-3

Ø PROVERB 16:9

Ø PROVERB 12:5

Ø PROVERB 19:21

Ø PROVERB 20:28

Ø JEREMIAH 29:11,12

WHY GOD GAVE ADAM A GARDEN AND NOT A FOREST?

Ø ORGANIZE YOUR LIFE

Ø PLAN YOUR LIFE

WHY DO WE NEED TO PLAN?

YOUR VALUE TO LIFE

1.    YOU WERE BORN TO SOLVE A PROBLEM

2.    YOU’RE GOD’S RESPONSE TO A NEED HE CREATED

3.    YOU’RE THE ANSWER TO A QUESTION GOD KNEW WOULD BE RAISED IN THIS GENERATION