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Uganda: Bunyoro Can Become a Food Basket
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New Vision (Kampala)
13 May 2008
Posted to the web 14 May 2008
Joshua Kato
Kampala
EMMANUEL Bigaba whistles as he harvests comb after comb of maize from his 20-acre shamba in Kinyabutunzi village, Bugahya county in Hoima district. His wife and farm helper follow him, clearing away whatever comb Baguma might have missed. His farm is in one of the most fertile areas of Bunyoro.
"I am going to dry the maize, then sell it later to the buyers from the city," he says.
Tumusiime can contribute to solving Uganda's food problems. However, his and other farmers' contribution would be larger and more profound if better mobilisation is done. During a recent tour of the Bunyoro region, President Yoweri Museveni marveled at the potential in Bunyoro. He, like most people, decried the lack of mobilisation that has prevented farmers in Bunyoro from realising full potential.
If government programmes like NAADS had performed to full expectation, the food situation would be better. During his tour of the region, President Museveni noted that only 32% of the population in Bunyoro is engaged in commercial agriculture.
While Ankole can only grow bananas and keep cattle, Bunyoro can grow cereals, tobacco, sugarcanes and keep animals. Potatoes, cassava and other foods can sustainably be grown in Bunyoro. There is also fish from Lake Albert. Cereals are mainly grown in the fertile areas of Bugahya in Hoima, Buyanja, Buliisa and in areas that formerly formed part of Budongo Forest in Masindi. Yet, comparatively, Ankole farmers are more productive than Bunyoro farmers.
The main difference between Bunyoro and Ankole lies in organisation. In Kiruhura district, which is one of the most organised agriculture areas in the country, cattle keepers are organised in groups, which do not only help them easily access markets, but also modernise their kraals. The President's visit to Bunyoro was perhaps the most rigorous one as far as mobilising the population to utilise the abundant agriculture potential is concerned.
Maybe it will act as a wake up call.
"I grow more than 15 acres of maize every year," says Achilles Ahebwa of Byeriima village, Buyanja county Masindi district. Although Ahebwa can grow this amount of maize, many other farmers on the same fertile soils cannot.
Ahebwa is lucky that about three years ago, he was given ox-ploughs by Bunyoro-Kitara Diocese, that enabled him increase the amount of acreage. This area has about 50 farmers, who have big acreage of uncultivated land. Certainly, with over sh6b spent under the NAADS programme in Bunyoro region for the last seven years, farmers should have access to small, but effective tools like ox-ploughs.
"If every farmer in our area gets at least a pair of ox-ploughs, we shall have an increase in maize produced per a year," Ahabwe says. Even with the lack of mechanisation or better farm tools, maize farmers in Buyanja produce an average of 50 bags of maize each.
But because of poor infrastructure and lack of maize processing factories, most of the maize is sold in the villages costs as low as sh100 per kilogramme. Most of the maize is bought by traders from as far as Kampala.
"I wish we get our own flour making factories that will pay us more than we are being paid at the moment," Joram Bagadya of Buliisa says.
If maize farmers in Bunyoro can get just a small percentage of the kind of mechanisation in say Kapchorwa, farmers here would be better off.
The President lamented about the billions of NAADS funds 'wasted' in seminars and sensitisation. For example, if the money had been used to buy ox-ploughs or even tractors, the situation would be better.
"Goats and other animals can also be kept in Bunyoro," says Rev Jonathan Kajura of Hoima Diocese, who is in charge of a project to multiply the number of animals in Bunyoro. The project has about 70 goats.
"We are going to expand it and turn it into a breeding center for goats," he says.
Throughout the hills and plains of Bunyoro, goats and sheep graze gracefully by the roadsides. However, nobody owns more than 100 animals. Mobilisation for large scale animal keeping has been low.
And when it came to acquiring them through the NAADS programme as the NAADS coordinators told the President, prices were inflated! For example, an ordinary piglet went for sh150,000. This is the price of four hybrid two-month-old piglets.
Bunyoro's local chicken is rated as some of the best in laying eggs and nursing their off springs to maturity.
David Byaruhanga, a NAADS extension worker and farmer from Bugambe Sub-County in Hoima district says Bunyoro chicken can be turned into a real gold mine.
"We have started new technologies of rearing Bunyoro indigenous chicken that will help bring out the untapped potential," Byaruhanga explains.
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But again, as President Museveni found out, plans to multiply local chicken were affected by inflated prices in some districts, under the NAADS programme. For example, in Masindi district, a single chicken was bought at sh30,000! Normally, this is the price of 10.
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