{"id":35458,"date":"2023-09-29T15:53:17","date_gmt":"2023-09-29T15:53:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/?p=35458"},"modified":"2023-09-30T04:34:43","modified_gmt":"2023-09-30T04:34:43","slug":"hope-as-farmers-united-opens-centre","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/hope-as-farmers-united-opens-centre","title":{"rendered":"Hope as Farmers United opens centre"},"content":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Botswana. <\/strong><\/span>Horticulture farmers under the banner of Farmers United have opened a distribution centre, wholly owned by farmers.<\/b><\/p>\n

Situated in Gaborone West Industrial area, Farmers United Distribution Centre is the country\u2019s hope following the closure of Botswana Horticultural Market years back.<\/p>\n

President Dr Mokgweetsi Masisi on September 27 posted on his Facebook page in appreciation of the latest development in the affirmation that when the country closed its borders to imports of agricultural produce, it wanted to achieve food security for Botswana by Batswana.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am happy to see Batswana venturing into farming & I want to encourage more, particularly the youth to take advantage of the opportunity that my government have provided,\u201d the President posted tagging a Farmers United member who had shared the announcement on her profile.<\/p>\n

Farmers United chairperson, Mr Ratsela Molefe, told BOPA during the visit to the Distribution Centre on Wednesday that although they were on their second week of opening, the number of customers coming in was satisfactory.<\/p>\n

He said among those coming to buy were hawkers and individual customers who got to know them through word of mouth.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe response has been very good,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Produce sold at the centre includes carrots, tomatoes, lettuce, green pepper, onions, garlic and cabbage.As per their model, farmers drop their produce and Farmers United takes the marketing responsibility and pays farmers on the agreed date.<\/p>\n

He said Farmers United has also created a platform where it takes commodities to consumers through field markets.<\/p>\n

As of now, Mr Molefe said, they had about 120 members countrywide who have created employment for about 350 workers in their different farms. At present, the farmers cultivate about 500 hectares of land if combined.<\/p>\n

He said opportunities for growth were abundant through the necessary support to fully use a total of 5700 hectares of land owned by their members.<\/p>\n

Regarding the ban on importation of horticulture imports, he said it had helped the local industry to grow and called for its extension.<\/p>\n

However, he said, illegal importation was still a problem.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere has to be hard-hitting punitive interventions for those illegally importing to deter them,\u201d he said, saying it seemed the interventions were not good enough.<\/p>\n

Though the ban had led to an increase in local produce, he said there was still more that the government could do to support the market.Such he said could include government enforcing its institutions to buy their produce from the market.<\/p>\n

Further, he said, local financial institutions were still dragging their feet to support the horticulture industry.<\/p>\n

He said Farmers United was also looking into tapping into value chain development through processing their produce.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is where the real value is, the processing of commodities is a low-hanging fruit for us as farmers\u201d he stated.<\/p>\n

He said commodities which could not find their way into the market would be processed as per their business model.Mr Molefe said their relationship with the retail industry was at individual farmers\u2019 level, though they hoped the industry would in future come onboard.<\/p>\n

For More News And Analysis About Botswana<\/a> Follow Africa-Press<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Africa-Press – Botswana. Horticulture farmers under the banner of Farmers United have opened a distribution centre, wholly owned by farmers. Situated in Gaborone West Industrial area, Farmers United Distribution Centre is the country\u2019s hope following the closure of Botswana Horticultural Market years back. President Dr Mokgweetsi Masisi on September 27 posted on his Facebook page […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":35457,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,5,7],"tags":[233,237,234],"class_list":["post-35458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-economy","category-head-lines","tag-africa-press","tag-africa-press-botswana","tag-botswana"],"yoast_head":"\nHope as Farmers United opens centre - Botswana<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Horticulture farmers under the banner of Farmers United have opened a distribution centre, wholly owned by farmers.<\/ ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/hope-as-farmers-united-opens-centre\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Hope as Farmers United opens centre\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Horticulture farmers under the banner of Farmers United have opened a distribution centre, wholly owned by farmers.<\/ ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/hope-as-farmers-united-opens-centre\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Botswana\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-09-29T15:53:17+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-09-30T04:34:43+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/botswana\/sites\/38\/2023\/09\/sm_1695985447.959558.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"800\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"532\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/hope-as-farmers-united-opens-centre#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/hope-as-farmers-united-opens-centre\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Hope as Farmers United opens centre\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-09-29T15:53:17+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-09-30T04:34:43+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/hope-as-farmers-united-opens-centre\"},\"wordCount\":519,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/hope-as-farmers-united-opens-centre#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/botswana\/sites\/38\/2023\/09\/sm_1695985447.959558.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Africa Press\",\"Africa Press-Botswana\",\"Botswana\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"economy\",\"head lines\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/hope-as-farmers-united-opens-centre#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/hope-as-farmers-united-opens-centre\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/botswana\/all-news\/hope-as-farmers-united-opens-centre\",\"name\":\"Hope as Farmers United opens centre - 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