AfricaPress-Tanzania: PRIME Minister Kassim Majaliwa yesterday urged tea growers here to secure loans from the Tanzania Agricultural Development Bank (TADB) to increase their disposable income, boost efficiency and make work less laborious.
A stunned by the diligence and drive of farmers intending their farms, a vividly happy premier beseeched the growers to secure loans from TADB in order to lessen the toil, produce quality and increase earnings.
He told a consultative meeting of tea stakeholders in the southern highlands regions going on here, that the reason for forming TADB was to solve many of the problems upsetting the farming community and called on farmers to get loans from TADB and other banks to solve their problems.
“Our strategy in government is to ensure all farm inputs are available to the farmers and avail good dependable infrastructure so that farming can be done with ease. This the reason why banks are ready to give loans to individual farmers or their cooperatives in order to buy things like tractors to make farming less strenuous,” Majaliwa told the delegates.
Responding to premier’s comments, TADB Southern Highlands Agricultural Officer Ashura Akimu told the meeting that because the government will build roads in tea growing areas, the TADB will loan farmers tractors so that their tea leaves to reach the nearest factory inside six hours to beat marketing deadline.
She also said the bank will loan cooperatives, big and medium farmers tea processing equipment to increase efficiency and lessen post-harvest losses.
Akimu told stakeholders that farmers in block farms will be supported by the bank to irrigate their farms by giving them equipment, drilling bore holes and establishing dams that will store rain water. The bank will also give them loans to buy fertilizers, pesticides and wrappers. “We have learnt that some farmers are growing tea without applying fertilizers. We plan to end this practice that is undermining farmers’ efforts and efficiency,” she pledged.
