By Our Reporter
Uganda’s agro-industrialisation programme is on the right track as government continues with implementation plans that should see the country earn more foreign exchange in the years ahead.
According to the World Bank, the agriculture sector in Uganda employs 70 percent of the population (87 percent of women and 63 percent of men and more than 80 percent of the poorest in rural areas).
Given this background, the Government of Uganda wants to transform Uganda’s agriculture through agro-industrialisation, one of the programmes in 2021 / 2025 Third National Development Plan (NDPIII). The objective is to increase total export value of processed agricultural commodities from US$935 million in 2020 to 2.5 billion, and increase the agricultural sector growth rate from 3.8 to 6.0 percent, among others.
Under the agro-industrialisation programme, it is hoped that 100,000 new jobs will be created. Government wants to reduce the percentage of households depending on subsistence farming and increase that number of households that are food secure from 60 percent to 90 percent.
The agro-industrialisation programme is aimed at increasing commercialisation and competitiveness in agricultural production and agro-processing. Uganda has a competitive advantage when it comes to food production because it has a favourable climate, and arable land, which facilitates low cost production, compared to its neighbouring countries.
Interventions
Some of the interventions include developing commodity value chains between farmers and the market, building regional warehouse storage capacities where the use of the warehouse receipt system is also included, providing long term agricultural financing and insurance, for instance farmers producing on large scale, and others engaged in agricultural value chain production can be linked to Uganda Development Bank to access cheap loans, and development of the infrastructure to enable the private sector take advantage of export market opportunities.
Under the agro-industrialisation programme, government launched the construction of milk cooling facilities, food processing plants, value addition facilities, improving the quality of agricultural inputs such as seeds pesticides, acaricides, establishing modern post-harvest handling facilities.
Sensitisation on sanitary and phytosanitary standards
Further Ugandan producers often find it difficult to meet sanitary and phytosanitary standards required to export goods to Europe and the United States, but government efforts are ongoing to address this challenge.
Sensitisation on sanitary and phytosanitary standards
Further Ugandan producers often find it difficult to meet sanitary and phytosanitary standards required to export goods to Europe and the United States, but government efforts are ongoing to address this challenge.
MAAIF continues to advise farmers to dry their produce like coffee and maize on tarpaulins or concrete slabs so that they can attract foreign market which observes international quality standards. A case in point when maize has aflatoxins, it cannot be bought and that is a loss to the farmers and produce traders. Aflatoxins post a health risk as it said to cause cancer.
Illegal fishing continues to be fought
For fisheries, most fish land sites have been supported with pos-harvest handling facilities such as concrete slabs, cold storage facilities, to keep the fish fresh. The campaign to eliminate illegal fishing on the lakes continue as MAAIF partners with security agencies, private sector, fishermen and other stakeholders.
Water for production
Government is also working on ensuring that farmers have water production through constructing irrigation schemes in some areas but also encouraging farmers to embrace small-scale irrigation so that the farmer can cultivate all the year round despite the drought. For instance, The Micro-scale Irrigation Programme under the Ministry of Water and Environment is in line with Uganda’s National Irrigation Policy which aims to create 1.5 million hectares of irrigated land by the year 2040.
Under the project, farmers get a solar-powered pumping station, a sprinkler system and a water tank that make water available to smallholder farmers to irrigate their farms and improve their agricultural yields, thus enhancing food security. This is provided they are close to a water source.
The Small-Scale Irrigation Programme brings the Ugandan government closer to one of its objectives, which is to improve the water supply for Ugandans. Other initiatives are underway, including the installation of irrigation systems at 687 sites in several districts of the country.
Mechanisation
Mechanised agriculture is the process of using agricultural machinery to simplify farming with the aim of increasing productivity. Though Uganda is endowed with fertile soils and favourable climate, the major factors that influence agriculture, the country continues to produce at a low scale. Studies have shown that 99.4% smallholder farmers in Uganda use traditional, rudimentary and obsolete technologies and methodologies for post-harvest operations. Government has come in to solve these challenges.
Government has laid several strategies such as promoting mechanisation along entire commodity value chain and promotion of mechanisation through viable farmer groups linked to markets. For farmers to get tractors, they are required to at least have land measuring one square mile, which calls for smallholder farmers to form groups or cooperatives in order to easily get tractor services.
Distribution of tractors
Data indicates that many tractors and implements have been procured and handed to farmer groups or progressive farmers at local level through cost-sharing model Access is through hire services to farmers. Agro-machinery dealers are partners and periodically stage outdoor shows to advertise.
Further bulldozers, graders, combine harvesters, forklifts, agro-processing machinery, farm tools, straw choppers, and excavators, among other equipment have been provided and continue to be provided to farmers across the country in a bid to boost commercial production, especially targeting regional targets
Uganda has 4,782 units of tractors both private and government-supplied and out of that number, about 25 percent of the tractors are in a functional while the Department of Agricultural Infrastructural Mechanization and Water for agricultural production has managed to set up and operationalised five mechanization centers in Mbale (Bungokho), Dokolo, Kiryandongo and Buwama with Namalere as the referral for all.
The Ministry is to guide the farmers correctly on the better methods of farming depending on their land holding capacity. For instance, farmers with small pieces of land can adopt intensive farming such as zero grazing, piggery, poultry keeping, fish farming, horticulture among others.
MAAIF intends to transform this agricultural system through promotion and adoption of appropriate and affordable mechanization technology shifting from traditional rainfed to irrigated agriculture, which is a mitigation to climate change since farmers can engage in production even during the dry spells.
Besides improving production efficiency, mechanisation in the country is supporting large-scale production and has improved the quality of farm produce. It also provides employment opportunities in communities and leads to agricultural led industrialisation and rural economic growth. It is also addressing the problem of labour shortage of able-bodied persons arising from rural-urban migration.
The PDM to transform agriculture
For FY 2022/23, programmed Shs 100 million per parish to be released under the financial inclusion pillar. The financial inclusion pillar has been allocated a total of Shs1,050bn and a similar amount is provided for in the financial year 2023/2023 to fund activities in the agriculture value chain with enterprises such as coffee, beans, maize, soybeans, macadamia, dairy farming, fish farming, fruits, piggery, and poultry keeping among others selected.
PDM, launched in February 2022, and planned to take five years, is considered by government as a game changer is expected to end poverty in all its forms everywhere, end hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture, with value addition and marketing being one of the key ingredients of the programme.
The goal of the PDM is to increase household incomes and improve the quality of life of Ugandans with a specific focus on the total transformation of the subsistence households [both on-farm and off-farm, in rural and urban settings]. The overall objective is to increase the effectiveness of the interaction between the Government and its people and to accelerate the realization of the Government’s long-term goal of Socioeconomic Transformation.
More
Eighty percent of Uganda’s land is arable but only 35% is being cultivated. In FY 2021/22, agriculture accounted for about 24.1% of GDP, and 33% of export earnings. Uganda produces a wide range of agricultural products including: coffee, tea, sugar, livestock, fish, edible oils, cotton, tobacco, plantains, corn, beans, cassava, sweet potatoes, millet, sorghum, and groundnuts.
Investors consider Uganda’s agricultural potential to be among the best in Africa, with low temperature variability, fertile soils, and two rainy seasons over much of the country – leading to multiple crop harvests per year. According to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization, Uganda’s fertile agricultural land has the potential to feed 200 million people.