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Tuesday 7 December, 2010

kilimokwanza@guardian.co.tz

SUPPORTING THE PROMOTERS OF THE GREEN REVOLUTION

98%

85%

70%

60%

50%

40%

23%

7%

4%

1.5%

0.8%

Land unsurveyed

Population that directly depends on agriculture

Fruit that goes to waste

Rural population livingin extreme poverty

Milk that goes to waste

Grain and !sh wasted

Budgetaryallocation toagriculture

Cultivatedland under

cash crops

Irrigableland under

irrigation

Growth rateof Agriculturesector in 09/10

Arable land underine"cientcultivation

A Snapshot ofAgriculture in Tanzania:

The NegativesOccupy the Higher

Percentagesof Tanzania’s

Agriculture

UUPPSSIIDDEEDDOOWWNN

By Kilimo Kwanza Reporter

If American all-round artisteDiana Ross were asked to as-sess Tanzania’s Agriculture,she would smile with reflexivecontent at the way the title ofher everlasting hit ‘Upside

Down’ has been preserved here. For thecountry’s agriculture sector seems to beorganised according to the famous in-verted pyramid, with the negativesheavily packed at the top and the posi-tives down in the diminishing bottom.

Only last week, President JakayaKikwete warned of the danger we arecourting continuing to rely on unreli-able rainfall for food production. Well,at the bottom of the pyramid of per-centages, we have irrigation, with lessthan one percent of the irrigable land isactually under irrigation. With suchabundant surface fresh water, we haveonly managed over the years to coverabout 250,000 hectares out of the 30million suitable for irrigation usingreadily available means. This meansthat when the rain does not come at theexpected time, as is bound to happenwith the increasing climate changephenomenon, farmers will not be ableto plant. And when it comes unexpect-edly, the result will be floods and theaccompanying soil erosion that willsweep away crops as happened earlierthis year.

But at the top of percentages, wehave 98 percent of the land remainingunsurveyed. This means that farmerscannot easily acquire titles for the landthey till. Therefore, banks will not lendthem money to invest in higher and im-proved production.

They can only rely on their savings– if they have any – to invest in betterfarming. Since most of them have nosavings, they are stuck. A few ‘lucky’ones are left at the mercy of loan sharkswho provide them with inputs on cred-it at a fixed price before planting, forwhich they have to pay when they har-vest at a time when everyone is har-vesting, thereby earning very little dueto low prices depressed by glut.

A couple of months later, the samefarmers have to buy back the foodstuffsthey earlier sold for a throw away priceat much higher prices from the shops.By failing to survey land and providingthe farmers with titles, we deny them aregisterable interest in the land, andcondemn them to bondage of the ruth-less moneylenders who go by decent-sounding titles like ‘farm suppliers’.

High up in the inverted pyramid isthe number of peasants, people who de-pend directly on the soil for their liveli-hood. An unacceptable 80 to 85 percentof Tanzanians depend on tilling the soilfor food. This statistic is nothing to beproud of, though it is often quoted withabandon.

Some basic mechanization of thefarming process would increase produc-tivity and free the people somewhatfrom spending whole days bent scratch-ing the soil with small hoes. If for ex-ample land is opened up using mecha-nized methods, a hectare would bemade ready in say, one hour instead ofone month it would take a strong manto plough it by hand.

He would then have enough time tocarry out other necessary functions toprepare and sow and maintain the gar-den. Since less people would be re-quired to till the land anyway, manywould be freed to work in other enter-prises.

The mechanization of agriculturenow calls for creativity and seriousness

than money. For example, thousands oftractors are now being imported intothe country but farmers who are being

urged to buy them simply cannot af-ford. In any case, given the small scaleof their operations, there is no justifica-

tion for them to purchase for owning atractor, even if they can afford. Waysneed to be devised for most farmers to

be able to hire tractors for only thehours they need them, not to buy forowning. In addition, our farmers needto start using tractors to the full, notsimply for ploughing.

Using a tractor only for ploughingis like using a computer only for typingletters, leaving over 90 percent of its ca-pacity idle. A tractor is meant to pumpwater for irrigation, to plant seeds, toharvest, to power initial processing, togenerate electricity for some of the farmoperations, all these just requiring fit-ting it with the relevant implements.

Other worrying percentages thatare high up there include the rate ofpost harvest losses. It stands a depress-ing 70 percent for fruits, 50 percent formilk and 40 percent for grain and fish.For fish matters are even worse be-cause there is another loss of immaturefish being harvest by methods as crudeusing mosquito nets. In other words,Tanzania can double its food supplyand security by NOT producing a singleextra kilo of grain or litre of milk, butby simply ensuring what is produced isall protected.

Some basic processing would cutthe damage, make all produce sellable,and bring millions of more Tanzaniansinto the daily cash economy. While halfof the milk produced is wasted before itgets to any consumer or cooling centre,more than half of the milk consumed inurban centres is imported and very ex-pensive.

The local demand for milk alone isenough to put an extra Sh 2 billion dai-ly in the pockets of Tanzania’s cattlekeepers, if what they produce daily canreach the consumers. Even the two mil-lion litres being wasted daily is far be-low the potential of the country’s 19million heads of cattle to produce. Ifthey can be allowed to access the do-mestic market alone, Tanzania’s cattlekeepers would have the motivation toimprove their stock and methods forhigher output.

Of course the ideal way to deal withpost harvest losses of grains is to en-courage the warehouse receipt systemand improve it. This would elevatewarehousing to the higher specializedlevel where it belongs, and remove theburden of keeping grain from the farn-ers who are not equipped to do it.Better still, warehouse receipts wouldupgrade the peasants to keeping theirwealth in records rather than physical,bulky and perishable form.

With the advent of the mobilephone, the peasants, most of whom al-ready have phones anyway, would starttransacting their grain stock by sms,clicking the order to sell how much atthe day’s price which they will have es-tablished by sms, and having theirmoney automatically remitted intotheir bank accounts.

The technology to allow theTanzanian farmers finally enter intothe twenty first century markets al-ready exists in the country with theseveral mobile networks.

Towards the narrow bottom of theinverted pyramid, we find the ‘achieve-ments’ of our agriculture sector. The seinclude the 7 (seven) percent govern-ment budgetary allocation toAgriculture, only 4 (four) percent of cul-tivated land being under the so-calledcash crops, the 1.5% growth of theAgricultural sector in the just ended fi-nancial year and the less than one per-cent of readily irrigable land being un-der actual irrigation. If Tanzania is toeffectively tackle the widespread masspoverty, the agriculture pyramid mustbe made to stand upright!

EDITORIALThe Guardian KILIMO KWANZA Tuesday 7 December, 2010

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The Guardian KILIMO KWANZACOVER STORY

Tuesday 7 December, 2010

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THE centre-piece article in this supplementtouches on the gains nations stand to makeby introducing genetically engineered – ormodified – organisms, more popularlyknown as GMOs. As usual, the focus is onfoodstuffs.

But the writer does not forget to discuss theheadaches and heartaches the technology has in storenot only for those nations adopting it but for humankindin general. This portion of the piece makes horrendouslyalarming reading.

The negative side of GMOs notwithstanding, the fe-rocity with which technology is spreading has been as-suming alarming proportions.

Indeed, few countries appear to have enough stami-na to stand their ground as the current sweeps acrossthe globe. For many, it is just a matter of time before ‘ne-cessity’ forces them to embrace the technology as well.

For quite some time after some of its neighbours de-cided that time to give way to technology, Tanzania re-mained relatively stable. There is however now evidencethat it too has snapped and could soon be a paradise forGMOs. The Guardian reported as long ago as mid-March2005 that the government had been asked to reschedulethe tabling of a draft policy in the National Assembly atleast to give stakeholders time to study and review thedocument.

A national network of agricultural groups and a sec-ond farmers’ association known as ParticipatoryEcological Land Use Management (PELUM-Tanzania)argues that the government drew up the draft policy lit-erally unbeknownst to other most other stakeholdersand therefore without caring to include their view.

In the opinion of the two associations, the draft poli-cy was in flagrant contravention to the CartagenaAgreement, which Tanzania had signed two years earli-er. Now, the said agreement is essentially an interna-tional protocol on biosafety. It was negotiated under theConvention on Biological

Diversity and has a raft of requirements membercountries are expected to comply with in relation toGMOs. The two associations’ argument, and indeed theargument of most of the countries and agencies reluctantto embrace the controversial but aggressively toutedtechnology, is that scientific research is yet to prove – be-yond reasonable doubt – the technology’s safety on peo-ple’s lives and the environment.

It is therefore argued that, regardless of the technol-ogy’s capacity to stave off hunger and poverty, there isstill great need to take precautionary measures to pro-tect the health of Tanzanians because adopting it whole-sale without weighing the gravity of the consequencescould spell a worse disaster than if it were shelved.

Until just over five years ago, reports said SouthAfrica was the only African country engaged in the com-mercial production of genetically modified crops, whileEgypt, Burkina Faso, Kenya, Tunisia and Zimbabwehad begun GM crop production experiments.

Tanzania has not been especially transparent aboutwhat is going on in its own agricultural and other labo-ratories with respect to similar trials, but it is reportedon authority that some work has been going on.

Both experts and ordinary citizens are agreed on theneed for the country to develop agriculture to a level atwhich it can improve food security in both the short termand on a more sustainable basis.

There is however as yet no consensus on whether toembrace or forget about GM technology as part of a na-tional strategy aimed at making the country self-suffi-cient in its food requirements.

Our view is that the issue around which the ragingdebate revolves is crucial to the nation’s survival and de-velopment and should continue – in the spirit of theKilimo Kwanza initiative.

The fact that the pros and cons of GM technology arenow also being discussed in the context of the food andother requirements of all the five East AfricanCommunity partner states adds invaluable weight to theneed for Tanzanians to take a fresh, more serious look attheir development strategies and priorities and whichtechnology to adopt.

Surely, it shouldn’t be all manner of technology ortechnology irrespective of the costs involved.

Wallace MauggoEditor

Technology, no doubt, butregardless of costs?

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Divestiture ofRanches IncreasesLocal Investment

Artwork & Design: KN Mayunga To have your organisation promoted in Kilimo Kwanza, Call: 0787 571308, 0655 571308 0754 571308

Inverted Pyramid: Is Tanzania’s AgricultureUpside Down?

EAC Heads of State LiftBan on Food Exports

SME Surveyors Urgedto Remember Farmers

98%

85%

70%

60%

50%

40%

23%

7%

4%

1.5%

0.8%

Land unsurveyed

Population that directly depends on agriculture

Fruit that goes to waste

Rural population living in extreme poverty

Milk that goes to waste

Grain and !sh wasted

Budgetary allocation to agriculture

Cultivated land undercash crops

Irrigable land underirrigation

Growth rate of Agriculture sector in 09/10

Arable land under ine"cient cultivation

POLICYThe Guardian KILIMO KWANZA Tuesday 7 December, 2010

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The Guardian KILIMO KWANZAPOLICY

Tuesday 7 December, 2010

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By Makuna Chirimi

PEOPLE have known forcenturies that children re-semble their parents.Gregor Mendel, an 18thcentury Czech monk isthe one who discovered

how to mathematically predict whichtraits parents would hand down totheir offspring. This discovery revolu-tionized agriculture and marked thebeginning of modern genetic science. Italso shed light on the process of evolu-tion.

The microscope that Mendel usedstill exists. He used it to observe single-grain pollination with the pollen mag-nified 179 times which disproved theo-ries by Charles Darwin and others thatone grain of pollen was not enough tofertilize a plant. Armed with thisknowledge, genetic scientists across theglobe are finding new ways to produceanimals and plants that have “desir-able” properties like drought and pestresistance and high yields.

In a presentation made to the justended East Africa Community Headsof State meeting that discussed amongother things, the EAC Food SecurityProtocol, Harvard University ProfessorCalestous Juma, asserts that Africacould feed itself within a generation,and become a major agricultural ex-porter.

Based on his new book, “The NewHarvest”, he calls on African leaders tomake agricultural expansion central toall decision-making and to seriously in-vest in infrastructure, irrigation, accessto credit and bio-technology. He alsomentions that selective use of geneti-cally modified (GM) crops in some ar-eas is a solution to the crippling foodshortages experienced in the Africancontinent where an estimated one inthree persons faces chronic hunger.

One of the core activities in theFourth Pillar of Kilimo Kwanza is theidentification of priority areas for thestrategic food commodities for thecountry’s food self-sufficiency.

A key task under this pillar for theMinistry of Agriculture, Food Securityand Cooperatives (MAFC) is to put inplace arrangements for the productionof strategic commodities of grains suchas maize, rice, wheat, sorghum andmillet, tubers like cassava and potatoesand animal products like meat, dairyand fish.

The ministry is also supposed toidentify priority areas and modalitiesfor the production of crops that canquickly transform agriculture withminimal financial and technological re-quirements. The government is sup-posed to put in place arrangements tofinance the production of cotton, sun-flower, sesame and palm oil.

Alarming reports from Tanzania’sEAC partner states of Kenya andUganda indicate that controlled GMmaize tests are slotted to start at theend of this year (2010). Kenya, Ugandaand other partner states of theCommon Market for Eastern andSouthern Africa (COMESA), Africa’slargest market bloc could have uniformbio-safety laws and regulations by2011, helping countries with a food

deficit to import cheaper commoditiesgenerated through GM technology.

Having pulled out of COMESA,Tanzania is a member of the SouthernAfrica Development Cooperation(SADC). While a number of key SADCcountries like South Africa are alreadycarrying GM tests, others likeTanzania are still striving to establishregulatory frameworks, legislation, bio-safety policy and internal infrastruc-ture and capacity to fully enforce it.

The existing structure ofTanzania’s biosafety regulatory systemis described in its National BiosafetyFramework (NBF). In that system, theNational Biosafety Focal Point (NBFP),who is responsible for review and ap-proving applications and overseeingthe implementation of bio-safety is-sues, is the Ministry for theEnvironment under the Vice-President’s Office.

The regulations that will establishTanzania’s biosafety system will bepromulgated under authority recentlyestablished in the TanzanianEnvironmental Management Act of2004 (EMA). That law provides the le-gal authority for the Ministry ofEnvironment to regulate GE organ-isms. The NBFP is now working on theregulations to implement the biosafetyprovisions of the Act and to establishthe procedures identified in the NBFP.

Tanzania also has established aninterim bio-safety regulatory processfor permitting small-scale confinedfield trials of plant and plant products.The Plant Protection Act puts in placea review and approval process for allsmall-scale confined field trials involv-ing genetically engineered plants. It re-quires the completion of an applicationwhich is reviewed by the AgriculturalBiosafety Advisory Committee (AB-SAC), a technical advisory committeeunder the Ministry of Agriculture, FoodSecurity and Cooperatives (MAFC).

However the duality of Tanzania’sinterests in the different trade blocsstill poses credible threats to the coun-try’s bio-safety and agriculture and assuch should be urgently evaluated, es-pecially through the EAC and SADC.This will help ensure that the samethings are viewed in the same scientif-ic way across the board.

GM crops are often touted as a “so-lution” to the food security crises inAfrica and the world at large. Thetechnology has its proponents and op-ponents with the proponents arguingthat high yielding GM’s crops offer aquick fix solution to growing food needswhile opponents point to the negativeenvironmental and social impacts.

The negative effects of GM foodshave been well documented. There areyet unknown risks to human, plant andanimal life, risks that could include ge-netic deformations and mutations, can-cers and the rise of super virus strainsand super diseases that are super-re-sistant to current drugs.

In countries producing GM foodslike the USA and Brazil, stringent carehas been taken to ensure that the GMproduce is used solely for non-humanconsumption like the production of biofuel. But a recent bio-scare in the US inwhich GM food was discovered in su-

Time Is Ripe to Focus on Enforcing Biotechnology and Bio-safety Laws• Focusing on pillar number four permarket shelves revealed, even strin-

gent laws and regulations don’t alwayswork.

GM foods require specialized han-dling, transport and storage facilitiesthat are entirely lacking in the region.For example they require safe trans-portation facilities in scientifically de-signed facilities to ensure that the GMdo not contaminate indigenous plantsin the areas or communities throughwhich they are being moved. Ourtransport and storage systems cannotmeet this requirement.

Furthermore porous borders allowunregulated movement of people, ani-mals, plants and goods, placing thewhole region at risk. Proponents of GMtechnology know this all very well

It is impossible to protect indige-nous crops from being contaminated byGM’s. Plant fertilization is throughpollen that is easily carried by wind,birds, insects and animals and thismakes it impossible to prevent crosspollination of GM and non-GM plants.In countries like Brazil, the US andSouth Africa, GM foods are only grownin areas where the entire peasant pop-ulation has been driven off the land.This leads to land alienation and land-lessness.

GM crops are inferior in the longrun because they often require large in-puts of imported fertilizers and pesti-cides and as such are also poorly suitedto peasant production methods. GMtechnology relies on the use of so called“terminator” seeds that can only beused once. Seeds harvested from “ter-minator” crops do not germinate andthis forces farmers to buy new seedstock in every growing season, creatingdependency.

Armed with these facts, should ourcountries even be toying with the ideaof adopting GM foods?

In Uganda for example the bio-safety (GM) law was allegedly rejectedby cabinet several times and even afterbeing presented to parliament the billhas remained pending for ten years.Reports have it that illegal GM trialsare set to start in Uganda and evenKenya where vocal parliamentariansopposed the GM’s but are now silentlypassing laws that support it.

Kenya is among EAC and COME-SA countries that have in the recentpast found themselves in deep contro-versy over the importation of genetical-ly modified foods to help cover for localproduction shortfalls. At the peak of thefamine last year, the then AgricultureMinister William Ruto went public insupport of GM saying the global domi-nance by GM maize was frustrating ef-forts to import the grain from key in-ternational markets to cover for localproduction deficit.

Furthermore, emerging reports bythe Canadian based Action Group onErosion, Technology and Cooperation(ETC) reveals a dramatic upsurge inthe number of patent claims on ‘cli-mate-ready’ genes, plants and tech-nologies that will supposedly allowbiotech crops to tolerate drought andother environmental stresses associat-ed with climate change.

Large multinational companieswith alleged to connection to so called

“agricultural development associa-tions” are allegedly trying to sell cropswith “added features” to countries likeTanzania. The punch line is that plantsthat are engineered to grow on poorsoils, with less rain and less fertiliserwill mean the difference between star-vation and survival for the poorestfarmers.

The patent grab on ‘climate-ready’crops is a bid to control not only theworld’s food security but also theworld’s yet-to-be commodified biomass.The term biomass refers to material de-rived from living or recently-living bio-logical organisms: including all plantsand trees, microbes, as well as by-prod-ucts such as organic waste from live-stock, food processing and garbage.

“It’s a fresh twist on a stale theme:Crops engineered with ‘climate-ready’genes will increase production and feedthe world,” the ETC group claims. Inmany cases, a single patent or patentapplication claims ownership of engi-

neered gene sequences that could bedeployed in virtually all major crops –as well as the processed food and feedproducts derived from them.

These emerging reports that thoseimplicated have so far denied, alsoclaim that in order to gain moral legiti-macy, the GM companies are teamingup with high-profile philanthropists,big governments and associations todonate free genes and technologies toresource-poor farmers – especially insub Saharan Africa. Some of the organ-isations mentioned in the damning re-port are already operating in Tanzaniaand the larger EAC region.

The downside is that African gov-ernments must ‘ease the regulatoryburden’ that might hinder the commer-cial release of transgenic crops and em-brace biotech-friendly intellectual prop-erty laws.

In the fog of climate chaos, the GM

manufacturers, some of whom alsomanufacturer the world’s leading pesti-cides and fertilisers allegedly hope toease public acceptance of geneticallyengineered crops and make the patentgrab more feasible.

The global market for drought tol-erance in just one crop – maize – is anestimated US$2.7 billion, but the USDepartment of Agriculture predictsthat the global bio-based market forchemicals and plastics alone will topUS$500 billion per year by 2025.

Agriculture is big business and ourcountries should take earnest care toprotect their people. Tanzania is a sig-natory to the Cartagena Protocol onBiosafety (2003) and as such is com-mitted to building functional nationalbio-safety frameworks for managingGM’s.

We cannot rely on technological fix-es to solve systemic problems of pover-ty, hunger and climate crisis. Climateresilience ultimately depends on agri-cultural biodiversity, local seed systemsand agro-ecological processes in thehands of farming communities.

Support is needed for breedingwork with under-utilised crops andwith plant diversity that offers naturaltolerance to harsh conditions.Indigenous and local farming commu-nities have developed and managedthat diversity and their role in develop-ing strategies for climate change adap-tation must be recognized, strength-ened and protected.

Conventional breeding alone hasproduced a vast number of varietiesand hybrids that have contributed tohigher grain yield, stability of harvestsand farm income. Better storage andharvesting techniques alone can doubleTanzania’s agricultural output.Irrigation will have a similar effect.Investing in infrastructure too will alsoincrease production whilst also openingup remote areas for investment in oth-er fields.

The concerns of GM’s effect to bio-logical diversity and human and ani-mal health are now widely acknowl-edged. These concerns and opportuni-ties surrounding modern biotechnologydictate the need to develop and enforcepolicy and legal interventions to guidethe safe use of biotechnology to preventand effectively reduce its risks to hu-man and animal health and the envi-ronment.

There is an urgent need not only toinstitute but more importantly to en-force elaborate legal, administrativeand policy instruments to minimizerisks of modern biotechnology to hu-man and animal health and the envi-ronment. Bio-safety encompasses allsectors - wildlife, beekeeping, fisheries,forests, shipping and aviation, indus-try, food, drugs, cosmetics, fertilizers,pesticides, foodstuffs, animals and en-vironmental management.

Policy makers and enforcers shouldalways remember that it only takes asingle grain of pollen from a GM plsntto fertilize and forever change a non-GM plant. Let us not wait for a GM ca-tastrophe to open our eyes to this fact.

The time to carefully think and actis now, before Tanzania finds herselfneck high in deep, unfamiliar waters.

“The downside isthat Africangovernmentsmust ‘ease theregulatory burden’that might hinderthe commercialrelease oftransgenic cropsand embracebiotech-friendlyintellectualproperty laws

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INTERVIEWThe Guardian KILIMO KWANZA Tuesday 7 December, 2010

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The Guardian KILIMO KWANZAPOLICY

Tuesday 7 December, 2010

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By Angel Navuri

MANGO and cottonfarmers in the coun-try can now benefitfrom huge marketopportunities avail-able in Turkey.

There is a ready market forTanzanian cotton in the country.Mangoes and passion fruits whichTanzania has in plentiful supply alsodo not grow in Turkey and this pro-

vides a unique export opportunity.Turkey also wants to cultivate cottonin Tanzania for export to feed its everexpanding textile industry.

According to the TurkishAmbassador Dr Sander Gurbuz,Turkish cotton production is currentlyunable to satisfy the needs of its grow-ing textile industry. The country isnow importing cotton from Tanzania.Still the industry demands remainhigher than current supply, and soTurkey wants to invest in cotton farm-

ing in Tanzania to boost exports. Plansare currently underway to find suit-able land for the project.

Every week the Turkish embassyreceives upwards of 20 Turkish busi-nessmen looking for areas to invest inagriculture and other sectors of theTanzanian economy. Some of the busi-nessmen are in contact with theTanzania Investment Centre (TIC) forinvestment assistance while others arealready looking for suitable land forcotton farming in Shinyanga Region.

Ready market“This initiative could help both

countries to strengthen the businesslinks and revamp the economies of thetwo countries,” the Ambassador said.

He added that investing cottonwould help Tanzania farmers to learnfrom their Turkish counterparts onhow to cultivate high quality cottonthat meets international market stan-dards. As many as 500,000 Tanzanianfarmers cultivate about 485,000hectares (1.2 million acres) of cotton inthe northern, coastal and western re-gions.

Turkey is projected to produceabout 500,000 tons of cotton this year.Only 10 percent of Turkish cotton isexported in raw form, while the restfeeds the domestic textile industry.Tanzania will this year produce onlyabout 90,000 tons of cotton, with 80%of this slotted for export. Global cottonproduction forecasts stand at 23.6 mil-lion tons this year.

There are still significant opportu-nities for purchasing Tanzanian growncotton and transforming it into yarnsand fabrics locally. Commenting onthis on a recent visit to cotton produc-ing areas, Tanzania’s PresidentJakaya Kikwete noted that while a kiloof cotton costs only 460 shillings, it pro-duces two shirts that fetch a muchhigher price at the market.

The history of textile production inTurkey dates back to the Ottoman pe-riod in the 16th and 17th centurywhere textile production was alreadyat an advanced level. There are nearly7500 textile manufacturers producingfor the export market alone in Turkey.The total export earnings from textiles($ 5.4bn) has increased five fold in thelast 20 years.

Tanzania’s garment manufactur-ing industry is relatively small.Developed in the 1970s as part of astate drive to industrialise the country,out of the 30 textile mills in existenceabout 80% were state-owned. In the1980s these mills consumed about athird of Tanzania produced lint.

However after the privatisationprogramme of the late 1990s many ofthese mills closed altogether.

Tanzania is Africa's fifth-largestlint-cotton producer, after Egypt,Nigeria, Burkina Faso and Benin, andthe world’s 20th largest producer.

FruitBecause of its different climatic

zones, Turkey is one of the seven coun-tries in the world that is self sufficienton basic foods.

Out of the 140 perishables grownin the world, the country produces 80varieties of fresh fruits and vegetablesand exports 30 kinds of vegetable and20 kinds of fruit. These exports areworth over US$1 billion annually toTurkey.

However a ready market exists forfresh mangoes and passion fruit fromTanzania and the Ambassador urgedlocal farmers and business men to ex-ploit this opportunity.

Agriculture with Industrial de-velopment

Agriculture may be the backboneof the economy in many developingcountries, but this alone is not enough.It has to be backed by value additionand the production of industrial goods.

It is in cognizance of this that the

Turkish economy tries to balance agri-culture with industrial growth.Historically, the agriculture sector hasbeen Turkey's largest employer and amajor contributor to the country'sGDP. Fifty percent of the country’smanufactured exports originate fromthe agricultural sector (primarily tex-tiles and clothing). Of Turkey's agricul-tural sector, crops account for 55 per-cent of the gross value, livestock repre-sents 34 percent, and forestry and fish-ing make up the rest.

Just as in Tanzania, many Turkishfarmers have been slow to adopt mod-ern techniques and much of the poten-tial land and water resources are stillmanaged inefficiently.

However the country's fertile soil,access to sufficient water, a suitableclimate, and hard-working farmers allmake for a successful agricultural sec-tor. A broad range of crops can begrown because of the variety of differ-ent climates throughout the country.This has allowed Turkey to become thelargest producer and exporter of agri-cultural products in the Near East andNorth African regions.

ExportsGiving an overview of his country’s

achievements, the Ambassador saidthat Turkey is one of the top 10 pro-ducers of fruit, wheat, and cotton in theworld.

More impressively it ranks amongthe top 5 producers of vegetables, tea,tobacco and raw wool. The country'smain export markets are the EU andthe United States, to which Turkey ex-ports dried fruit and nuts, cotton, andtobacco. Another major export marketis the Middle East which buys freshfruit, vegetables and meats fromTurkey.

Grain and vegetables Vegetable production in Turkey is

primarily made up of cereals, pulses(edible seeds of various pod-bearingplants such as peas, beans, or lentils),industrial crops, and perishables. Ofthese, cereal crops occupy more thanhalf of the cultivated land. “Of all thesewheat has a special place in theTurkish economy.

Turkey is both a top 10 producerand a top 10 consumer of wheat in theworld. It is the essential food elementin the Turkish diet, generally eaten inthe form of bread,” AmbassadorGurbuz explained.

Turkey is also the main pulse pro-ducer in the Middle East and one of theleading producers in the world. Sincethe mid-1990s, over 60 countries im-port Turkish pulses, primarily chick-peas and lentils.

FACT BOXTurkey is situated in Anatolia and

the Balkans, bordering the Black Sea,between Bulgaria and Georgia, andbordering the Aegean Sea and theMediterranean Sea, between Greeceand Syria.

Total land area is about 783,562square kilometres of which 756,816 sqkm are in Asia and 23,764 sq km are inEurope. Tanzania is 945,087 squarekilometres.

The Anatolian part of Turkey(large, semi arid plateau) accounts for97% of the country's area. It is alsoknown as Asia Minor, Asiatic Turkeyor the Anatolian Plateau.

SURVEYORS of Smalland Medium Enterprises(SME) have been re-minded to include farm-ers in their surveys.“When people talk about

SMEs they think of citizens involvedin small industries and trade but donot consider farmers as part and par-cel of SMEs,” the Head of theTanzania Investment Centre (TIC)Emmanuel Ole Naiko (pictured),said.

“Let us use these SMEs as a ve-hicle to develop commercial agricul-ture in Tanzania,” he added.

He was speaking at the launch ofthe Tanzania Top 100 Mid-sizedCompany Survey in Dar es Salaam.

The survey targets businesses thatearn between TSH 1 – 20 billion peryear.

According to the TIC head, con-tract farmers who have establishedlinkages with large farmers inTanzania are extremely successful.For example about 55% of the pro-duction at Kilombero SugarCompany comes from out growers.

He said that a “health check” per-formed on SMEs by the TIC had re-vealed vast improvements in atti-tude, performance and service deliv-ery of the companies.

Giving an example of South

Korea which by investing in educa-tion, has managed to raise the percapita income of its citizens fromUSD80 to USD25,000 in just fiftyyears, the TIC head urged the SMEsto invest in educating their labourforce for effective production.

This is the only way that the pri-vate sector can be the engine of eco-nomic growth as the country stillfaces a shortage of skilled labour.

In the last two years the TIC hasalso conducted entrepreneurshiptraining in marketing, financing,preparation of books of accounts, leg-islation and regulation and business

management for 716 entrepreneursacross the country.

He revealed that the TIC is work-ing closely with UNCTAD (UnitedNations Council for Trade andIndustrial Development) to createbusiness linkage between local SMEsand transnational or large businessesoperating in the country.

Ole Naiko reiterated the TIC andgovernment’s commitment to removeunjustifiable risks, costs and barriersthat hinder SMEs from thriving inbusiness.

The unreliability and high cost ofelectricity and poor infrastructureare some of the major barriers to in-vestment and trade in the coun-try.

By Angel Navuri, Arusha

The East African Community(EAC) Heads of State have lifted a banon food exports to enable farmers toenjoy the fruits of their labour.

The EAC leaders made the deci-sion at the recently ended East AfricanHeads of State Retreat on FoodSecurity and Climate change summitheld in Arusha. They said banning foodexports contributed to reduction ofquality, quantity and value of the agri-cultural produce and therefore agreedthat farmers be allowed to export.

However, Tanzania’s Minister forAgriculture and Food Security,Jumanne Maghembe said in an inter-view that Tanzanian farmers can onlyexport food when there is enough tocater for all regions.

Maghembe said Tanzania cannotexport food while it is facing shortagesin some parts of the country.

“Although the ban on food exportshas been removed, we cannot exportfood while Tanzania is facing short-ages in some of the regions,” the minis-ter explained.

According to media reports, someparts in the country are facing foodshortages and the government hasbeen urging the areas that haveenough food to sell to such regions.However, this has been difficult insome areas given poor infrastructure.

During the summit, PresidentMwai Kibaki of Kenya said the regionis endowed with a huge potential andcapacity to produce adequate food forlocal consumption and export.

He said this being the case therewas a need to make concerted efforts tofacilitate the movement of food fromsurplus areas to deficit regions.

Kibaki added that the free flow ofagricultural produce across memberstates “will have immense benefits tous all, producers will stand to benefitfrom enlarged market and consumerswill have adequate supply of commodi-ties.” “l therefore appeal for faster har-monization of the East African staplefoods standards to facilitate trade as

we encourage the free trading for agri-cultural commodities. We must howev-er guard against speculators who mayseek to manipulate our markets fortheir own individual benefit,” saidKibaki.

The EAC food security Action Planindicates that arbitrary bans on sellingof cereals leads to reduction in quality,quantity and value, causing losses tothe economy as a whole and the exportbans and other trade reactions scareaway private sector development andinvestments in food sub-sector, leadingto sluggish growth in the sub-sectorand lost opportunities to farmers and

consumers.On food security and cooperatives

it indicates that, food production isnormally satisfactory at the nationallevel, but it fluctuates between years ofsurplus in good seasons and years ofdeficit in poor rainfall seasons.

Some regions and districts havefood surpluses of varying magnitudeon an annual basis. However, there areregions and districts with pockets ofpersistent food shortage annually.Moreover, at the lower levels, such asthe household, efforts by governmentand others to support increased agri-cultural productivity and production

not withstanding, food insecurity con-tinues to be a challenge to some sectionof the population in both rural and ur-ban areas.

Even in times when food availabil-ity is deemed satisfactory, food accessis still a challenge to rural householdsthat produce less than 30 percent oftheir annual requirements due toamong other things rudimentary pro-duction tools and agricultural tech-nologies and climate change.

In Tanzania, the agricultural sec-tor, which offers livelihoods to morethan 80 percent of the population andis the mainstay of the economy is high-ly vulnerable to weather sensitivityand environmental changes and rankstop in the list of sectors vulnerable toclimate change.

The sector’s structure of produc-tion is highly dominated by subsis-tence producers who have limited enti-tlements and limited resources to de-velop mitigation strategies. As such,production (crops, livestock, fisheries)failure due to the impacts of climatechange among other factors contributeto food insecurity.

Heads of State Retreat on FoodSecurity and Climate change on the

EAC food security action plan has cit-ed the East African Common marketprotocol as an important instrument ofensuring food security in the region.

The EAC Action plan estimatedthat between 70 percent to 80 percentof the labour force of the EAC is in-volved in the food sector in one way oranother, and that between 24 percentand 48 percent of the GDP of the num-ber of countries is contributed by theagriculture sector.

According to the action plan thefigures may be under estimated be-cause they often do not take into ac-count livestock, fisheries and otherfood supply systems.

The plan also highlighted the needfor regional policy and standards forfood security as the regional perspec-tive required to accelerate food securi-ty in East Africa is currently seriouslyhampered by the frequent impositionof export bans even between districtswithin one country. This practice re-sults in the separation of the surplusfood production zones from the deficitmarkets they would normally serve inboth large cities and rural areas.

A recent assessment report by theWorld Bank of maize marketing inEast Africa shows that protectingmeasures through export bans leads tolost opportunities for farmers andtraders, who then reduce their invest-ment in production in subsequent sea-sons leading to overall reduction infood production.

The EAC is in the process of devel-opment, adoption and implementationof the regional legal, regulatory and in-stitutional framework for EAC SPSProtocol. The draft protocol was adopt-ed by the last Sectoral Council onAgriculture and food security whichwas held in December 2009.

The principal objective of the pro-tocol is to adopt and enforce sanitaryand phytosanitary measures in orderto minimize their negative effects ontrade. The protocol elaborates rules forapplication, which relate to the use ofcountries to implement these meas-ures

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Vast Opportunities for Cotton and Mango Farmers in Turkey

xxxxxx

SME Surveyors Urgedto Remember Farmers

EAC Heads of State LiftBan on Food Exports

“We cannot exportfood whileTanzania is facingshortages in someof the regions

– Minister Maghembe

“

INVESTMENTThe Guardian KILIMO KWANZA Tuesday 7 December, 2010

8

THERE is an increase inprivate investment in freerange beef cattle ranchingin Kagera region, follow-ing the government’smove to sub-let portions of

the National Ranching Company(NARCO). Speaking to KilimoKwanza recently, ranchers from the re-gion also commended the governmentfor its divestiture programme that haspresented commercial ranching oppor-tunities to farmers.

“We are now able to keep more cat-tle and improve the quality of meat weproduce,” Faustine Rutahoile ofUkurwa Limited Ranch said. He addedthat ranching has also increased pro-duction because cattle now birth once ayear as opposed to once every threeyears when herded in the village.

The rancher also commended thegovernment for subsidies to agricultureand the livestock sector as this hasmade inputs more affordable.

“The price of one litre of cattle dip isnow only half its original price,” hesaid, adding that the present challenge

is finding ready markets for the beef.The government has therefore beenurged to build more abattoirs in areasclose to the ranches.

Currently there are only two publicabattoirs in Arusha and Dodoma withthe capacity to slaughter about 200 cat-tle and 200 small ruminants each perday. The Dodoma abattoir has a MeatTechnology Training Centre, which isbeing used to train local entrepreneurson meat cuts technology.

A number of private meat process-ing plants are also emerging and this iscreating a demand for quality livestockproducts, thus motivating livestockproducers to increase off take rate andconsequently increase efficiency in theproduction chain.

However the livestock farmers stillface many challenges, key amongwhich is lack of access to credit. “Banksclaim that there is high risk in livestockkeeping and as such are not interestedin offering loans to farmers,” the ranch-ers said. This severely hampers devel-opment and the ranchers have calledon government to institute policies that

will assist the ranchers to access credit.Recently the president launched

the agricultural facility in the TanzaniaInvestment Bank (TIB) that is expect-ed to lead to the formation of a farmersbank.

Other challenges facing the ranch-ers include conflicts with farmers whoindiscriminately start fires to clearland for cultivation . The fires oftenspread to the ranches, destroying pas-tures and water sources.

Water conflicts, charcoal burningactivities, disease outbreak (especiallyfoot and mouth) which caused quaran-tines last year and droughts also pose asignificant threat to successful ranch-ing. “We have a program to eradicatefoot and mouth disease by inoculatingall our cattle at least twice every sixmonths. We are also cross breedingzebu cattle with the boran breed to im-prove meat quality,” Rutahoile said.

Tanzania has a land resource baseestimated at 94 million hectares out ofwhich 50 million hectares are range-lands suitable for livestock production.

T he country endowed with a livestock

resource and ranks third in Africa interms of cattle population. The esti-mated livestock population amountsto 18.5 million cattle, 13.1 milliongoats, 3.6 million sheep and 30 millionindigenous chickens. Distribution and ownership of live-

stock is highly skewed with about70% of the herd being concentrated ineight administrative regions includ-ing, Shinyanga, Mwanza, Singida,Mara, Tabora, Arusha, Manyara andDodoma. Rangeland resource is estimated at

61 million hectares of which about 44million hectares are for grazing and17 million hectares are fallow andforestland. This resource is currentlysupporting about 17 million tropicallivestock units (TLU).However, if the rangeland resource

is well developed and managed willopen up more grazing land that willsupport over 20 million TLU. There istherefore room for expansion of thelivestock industry and hence the po-tential for further investment oppor-tunities.

Divestiture of RanchesIncreases Local Investment

KILIMOKWANZADIRECTORY

WATER AND SANITATION

Dar es Salaam Water and Sewerage Authority(DAWASA) – Tel: +255 22 276 0006

Dar es Salaam Water and Sewarage Corporation(DAWASCO) Tel: +255 22-2131191/4

Drilling and Dam Construction Agency (DDCA)Tel: +255 22 2410430/2410299

Energy and Water Utilities Regulatory Authority Tel: +255 22 2123850, 22 2123853

Water and Environmental Sanitation ProjectsMaintenance Organization (WEPMO)Tel: +255 22 2410738, 716 099959

Ministry of WaterTel: +255 22 245 1448

INDUSTRY SUPPORT ANDASSOCIATIONS

Small Industries Development Organization(SIDO) – Email: dg@sido.go.tz, info@sido.go.tz

ANSAF - P.O. Box 6370, Dar es Salaam

CNFA - info@cnfatanzania.org

Tractors LimitedCells: +255 784 421606, 786 150213

Consolidated Holdings Corporation (CHC)Tel: 255 (022) 2117988/9

Vocational Education and Training Authority(VETA) – Tel: +255 22 2863683/2863409

Export Processing Zones in Tanzania (EPZ)Tel: +255 22 2451827-9

Agricultural Economics Society of Tanzania(AGREST) – Tel. +255-23 260 3415

Tanzania National Business Council (TNBC)Tel: +255 22 2122984-6

Tanzania Agriculture Partnership (TAP)Tel: +255 22 2124851

Tanzania Milk Processors Association (TAMPA)Tel: +255 222 450 426

Rural Livelihood Development Company (RLDC)Tel: +255 26 2321455

Tanzania Cotton BoardTel: +255 22 2122564, 2128347

Horticultural Development Council of Tanzania (HODECT)Cell: +255 789 222 344; Fax: +255 27254 4568

TATEECO Ltd – Tel: +255 784 427817

AGRO-PROCESSING

ERTH Food - Tel: +255 22 2862040

MUKPAR Tanzania Ltd Tel: +255 28 250038/184

ASAS Diaries Limited - Tel: +255 26 2725200

Tanga Fresh – Tel +255 27 2644238

NatureRipe Kilimanjaro LimitedTel: +255 22 21 51457

EQUIPMENT

Gurudumu Tatu LimitedTel: +255 22 2865632 / 2863699

National Service Corporation Sole (SUMAJKT)Cell: +255 717 993 874, 715 787 887

FINANCE

Private Agricultural Sector Support (PASS)Tel: 023-3752/3758/3765

Community Bank AssociationTel: +255 22 2123245

Bank of TanzaniaP.O. Box 2939, Dar es Slaam, Tanzania

AGRO-INPUTS

Minjingu Mines & Fertilizers LtdTel: +255 27 253 9259 250 4679