Africa-Press – Tanzania. THE government plans to address shortages of sugar and edible oil, the two commodities which often frustrate traders and consumers.
Speaking recently, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Agriculture Gerald Kusaya said Tanzania had good land and climate to produce raw materials and so it was well-positioned to address the shortages.
Official figures from the ministry, show that Tanzania holds a deficit of 60,000 tonnes of sugar annually and 365,000 tonnes of cooking oil.
“One of the key strategies is to increase land for irrigation farming,” the PS said, urging directors in the ministry to cooperated with stakeholders to ensure the government’s plan succeeded.
Initially Mr Kusaya said out of 44 million hectares for farming, 29 million hectares had the potential for irrigation farming, yet less than 700,000 hectares had irrigation infrastructure.
“The fifth phase government plans to reach at least 1.2 million hectares and this will further help improve food security, increase people’s incomes and raw materials for agro-processing factories,” he said.
Minister for Agriculture, Prof Adolf Mkenda, said earlier last week that his ministry would bank on good agricultural practices to boost the agricultural sector.
He challenged Tanzania Agricultural Research Institute (Tari) and Agricultural Seeds Agency (Asa) to intensify their studies and ensure farmers were exposed to improved seeds and agro-inputs that offered huge yields on a relatively small land.
“We have the market for some of the crops, but we need more markets to ensure every produce gets to the market,” he said. The minister said the government would support access to capital among farmers to ensure they produced crops needed in the market.
In recent months, the shortage of sugar was attributed to the impact of the coronavirus pandemic. Authorities also blamed traders for sugar to hike prices.
The Sugar Board of Tanzania (SBT) announced that demand for sugar in 2019/20 stood at 670,000 tonnes in which domestic needs were 515,000 tonnes.
On the other hand, experts said the ministry must undertake transformation initiatives to reduce the importation of foods such as edible oil and sugar could be produced locally.
In 2019, the country’s edible oil stood at 676.2bn/- ($294 million). It is, however, estimated that demand for cooking oil will increase to 700,000 tonnes by 2030.
