Africa-Press – Tanzania. THE government says it is fully committed to empowering avocado producers in Iringa Region and the country at large so that they can engage themselves in improved agriculture, the National Assembly was told on Tuesday.
The commitment was given in the August House by Deputy Minister for Agriculture, Anthony Mavunde, when responding to a question by Special Seats Member of Parliament (MP), Ritta Kabati (CCM), who wanted to know plans by the government in empowering avocado farmers in Iringa Region.
“In our serious efforts to empower improved avocado farmers in Iringa Region, the government in collaboration with the private sector will continue looking for important stakeholders in order to increase volumes of avocado production from 190,000 tonnes in 2018 to about 215,000 tonnes in 2022/2023 financial year,” he added.
According to the deputy minister, in order to meet the government’s target, the Ministry of Agriculture will empower the Tanzania Agricultural Research Institute (TARI) via TARI centres of Uyole and Tengeru to have the capacity to produce 20,000,000 seedlings, which will be used to cultivate 114,285.72 hectares of land.
He said the seedlings would be distributed to farmers at a subsidized price which is not more than 2,000/- per kilo, adding that the Tanzania Official Seed Certification Institute (TOSCI) would oversee and supervise registration of avocado producers and provide certificates of registration for quality assurance of their products.
The deputy minister further said TOSCI would equally provide capacity building training to farmers as well as awareness campaigns on the use of quality seedling produced through tissue culture.
“The institute will also put up common use facilities centres as well as cold rooms at all production areas including Iringa Region,” he said.
Recently, the Minister for Agriculture, Hussein Bashe said the Tanzanian government intends to triple domestic avocado production.
He pledged to continue investing heavily in research and improved seedlings to facilitate avocado farming. The goal, according to him, is to increase production of the crop annually in the next three years.
Mr Bashe stated that the government through TARI would increase efforts to ensure that it comes up with impactful research so as to support farmers who venture into the crop.
“The government in collaboration with the private sector will, from next year, start producing improved avocado seedlings and supply them to farmers in various regions while capacitating them with prerequisite knowledge and skills on how to grow them for better yields,” he insisted
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