KILIMO KWANZA: Contribution to Food Security and Hunger in Tanzania PAPER PRESENTED AT THE HUNGER FREE CAMPAIGN DIALOGUE FORUM BY N. MASSAO AT HILUX HOTEL,

KILIMO KWANZA: Contribution to Food KILIMO KWANZA: Contribution to Food Security and Hunger in TanzaniaSecurity and Hunger in Tanzania

PAPER PRESENTED AT THE HUNGER FREE CAMPAIGN PAPER PRESENTED AT THE HUNGER FREE CAMPAIGN DIALOGUE FORUMDIALOGUE FORUM

BY N. MASSAO BY N. MASSAO AT HILUX HOTEL, MOROGOROAT HILUX HOTEL, MOROGORO

16 OCTOBER, 200916 OCTOBER, 2009

INTRODUCTIONINTRODUCTION

•Agriculture plays an important role in Tanzania – Provides livelihood to more than 70 percent of the

population. – Accounts for 25.7 percent of GDP – Provides strong inter-sectoral linkages with non-farm

sectors, both backward and forward linkages

Thus, Agricultural development therefore remains a key to the country’s economic and social development, at least in the foreseeable future

ObjectiveObjective

• The objective of this paper is to accentuate the role that KILIMO KWANZA will contribute in enhancing food security and hunger eradication in Tanzania through agricultural transformation.

The KILIMO KWANZA ConceptThe KILIMO KWANZA Concept

• A number of initiatives aimed at improving the performance of the agriculture sector in the country had been implemented over the past years. These included, the Iringa Declaration of Siasa ni Kilimo (Politics is Agriculture), Kilimo cha Kufa na Kupona (Life and death effort to improve agriculture) and the Arusha Declaration. Besides, strategic frameworks such as Tanzania Development Vision 2025 (TDV 2025), National Strategy for Growth and Reduction of Poverty (NSGRP), Agricultural Sector Development Strategy (ASDS), Agricultural Sector Development Programme (ASDP) have been putting emphasis on agriculture transformation from subsistence to commercial one.

KILIMO KWANZA Concept..KILIMO KWANZA Concept..

• Agriculture in Tanzania has been growing at a rate of about 3.3% per year since 1985, a rate slightly higher than the population growth rate of 2.8% per annum, with variations depending on weather (MAFS, 2004).

• The main food crops have grown at a rate of 3.5 percent whereas export crops at 5.4 percent per year.


• Considering that the overall GDP growth target for halving abject poverty by 2010 is in the range of 6-7 percent, this performance falls short of the needed growth.

• The growth has declined from a record 5.8 percent in 2004 to 5.2 percent in 2005 and 3.7 percent in 2006 due to unfavorable weather conditions amongst others.

• For enhanced food security situation and poverty reduction, the sector should grow at an average rate of 10% per annum


• The main obstacles that hinder the development of the agricultural sector include:

(i) poor access and low use of improved seeds and fertilizers;

(ii) Under-investment in productivity enhancing technologies including agricultural mechanisation;

(iii) Limited access to financing for uptake of technologies;

(iv) Unreliability of rainfall in some of the regions; and

(v) Limited use of available water resources for irrigated agriculture. Due to these constraints, performance of the sector has not been

that impressive.


• Thus, the major thrust of the KILIMO KWANZA is to modernize and commercialize agriculture. All levels of agriculture, be it small, medium or large have a role to play by effectively utilizing the nation’s land whether small or large, provided the farmers can achieve a level of productivity that puts the operation on commercial scale.

Pillars of KILIMO KWANZAPillars of KILIMO KWANZA

• The most fundamental factor in the implementation of KILIMO KWANZA will be Political Will. While launching the India’s green revolution, its then the Prime Minister, the late Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru said “Everything can wait, but not agriculture”. This was also echoed by Baba wa Taifa, the late Mwalimu Julius K. Nyerere in one of his speeches where he said “because of the importance of the agriculture in our development one would expect that agriculture and the needs of the agricultural producers would be the beginning and the central reference point of all our economic planning. Instead, we have treated agriculture as if it was something peripheral, or just another activity in the country, to be treated at par with all the others, and used by others without having any special claim upon them.. We are neglecting agriculture. If we are not, every ministry without exception, every parastatal and every party meeting would be working on the direct or indirect needs of agricultural producers… We must now stop this neglect of agriculture. We must now give it the central place in all our development planning. For, agriculture is indeed the foundation of all our progress”.

Pillars of KILIMO KWANZA….Pillars of KILIMO KWANZA….

In view of the foregoing, KILIMO KWANZA is guided by 10 pillars. These include;

– Vision of KILIMO KWANZA;– Financing KILIMO KWANZA;– Institutional reorganization for management of KILIMO

KWANZA;– Paradigm shift to strategic framework of KILIMO

KWANZA;– Land for KILIMO KWANZA;– Incentives for KILIMO KWANZA;– Industrialization for KILIMO KWANZA;– Science, technology and human resources for KILIMO

KWANZA;– Infrastructure development for KILIMO KWANZA; and– Mobilizing Tanzanians for KILIMO KWANZA.

Implementation of KILIMO Implementation of KILIMO KWANZAKWANZA

• Based on the above-mentioned KILIMO KWANZA pillars, the implementation would basically involve a both the public and private sector. For this to be attained agriculture must now be viewed not as means to poverty alleviation but rather a means of wealth creation. This as pointed out earlier would require bringing small scale farmers into the main stream of a modern and commercial agriculture economy.

• This would be done through the paradigm shift based on the production pattern of the specific area. Thus, there would be a need to select strategic commodities which would move Tanzania from the perpetual dependency on non-market based production to market based one.

KILMO KWANZA Contribution KILMO KWANZA Contribution Towards Hunger EradicationTowards Hunger Eradication

• The Tanzanian Government’s commitment is replicated in implementing the World Food Summit Plan of Action contained in the 1996 Rome Declaration on World Food Security and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), as internationally agreed targets of halving poverty, malnutrition and hunger by the year 2015. Similarly, the Government is committed to implement the African Union’s (AU) Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP). CAADP has five pillars one of which is increasing food supply and reducing hunger.

KILMO KWANZA Contribution KILMO KWANZA Contribution Towards Hunger Eradication……Towards Hunger Eradication……

• The Government’s commitment to address the food security issues is well reflected in implementing the National Strategy for Growth and Reduction of Poverty (NSGRP) goals and objectives. NSGRP envisages the agriculture sector growth from 5 percent in 2002/03 to 10 percent per annum by year 2010.

• Thus, NSGRP requires an increase in agricultural productivity, higher added value and improved producer price incentives (Tanzania, United Republic of, 2006). In order to achieve this, the Government is currently implementing a number of strategic interventions.


• These are (i) Improvement of farm Inputs accessibility; (ii) Construction and rehabilitation of infrastructure; (iii) Promotion of agricultural mechanisation (iv) Support Services and farmer empowerment ; and (v) Involvement of the youth in agriculture


• Provision of improved seeds

In order to ensure the sustanaibility of the availability of the improved seeds in the country, the Government would continue with the rehabilitation of its five seed farms located in the main agro ecological zones.

• Support On-farm Seed Production

Facilitating farmers to produce quality declared seed on farm for field and vegetable crops; (ii) Training of Subject Matter Specialists and farmers on quality declared seeds production (iii) supporting monitoring and evaluation of the quality declared seeds production programme; and (iv) facilitating district seed inspectors for quality control.


• Strengthening of Agricultural Inputs Guarantee Scheme

This intervention would benefit agro-dealers in terms of entrepreneurship skills acquisition. This intervention is expected to encourage rural-based agro-dealers to carefully screen their customers and extend credit to them as well as extending the benefits of the Guarantee Fund (GF) beyond the primary recipients. In this way the capacity of agro-dealers to access credit to meet incremental working capital requirements for acquisition and distribution of inputs would be strengthened.

• Strengthening of Farm Inputs Distribution Network

– production and distribution of agricultural inputs vouchers – sensitization campaigns for the regions, district and village authorities on

subsidizing agricultural inputs through voucher system; and – establishment of the national input voucher scheme monitoring and

evaluation system.


• Improvement of Irrigation Scheme Performance

- rehabilitation of selected irrigation schemes;

- improvement of existing smallholder traditional irrigation schemes;

- construction of rain water harvesting and storage structure; and

- establishment of machinery hire service unit in irrigation schemes.


• Promotion of Agricultural Mechanization – Promotion of draft animal and mechanical power as

well as agro-processing – To improve accessibility to various agro-mechanization

technologies in various alternatives will be looked at in collaboration with the district councils. Some of the alternatives will include the promotion of wide use of power tillers, strengthening of SACCOS, identification of NGOs and development projects within the districts, which may support farmer initiatives and discussions with financial institutions that may offer credits.

KILMO KWANZA Contribution KILMO KWANZA Contribution Towards Hunger Eradication……Towards Hunger Eradication……• Support Services and Farmer Empowerment

– Government would increase the number of rural households receiving extension services from 35% to 45% by 2010/2011 by employing new workers, engaging private sector and NGOs in service provision and adopting extension approaches that cover a wide area at a relatively low cost. It is also planned to strengthen the capacity of extension service providers and farmer-extension-research linkages through District Agricultural Development Plans (DADPs).

– Approaches such as on farm demonstrations and extension services using Farmer Field School (FSS) and farmer group would be emphasized and enhanced

KILMO KWANZA Contribution KILMO KWANZA Contribution Towards Hunger Eradication……Towards Hunger Eradication……• Involvement of the Youth in Agriculture

The Government has now embarked on programme to attract the youth in agricultural production

The youth will be:– Organized into groups and establish youth Agriculture camps– trained and given land for agricultural commercial production (

training has started in Kigoma)– Assisted in accessing credit from the financial institutions– Provided with farm machinery and implements- there is an on

going pilot project in Mtwara and Lindi supported by FAO

ConclusionConclusion

AHSANTENI KWA KUNISIKILIZAAHSANTENI KWA KUNISIKILIZA

KILIMO KWANZA: Contribution to Food Security and Hunger in Tanzania PAPER PRESENTED AT THE HUNGER FREE CAMPAIGN DIALOGUE FORUM BY N. MASSAO AT HILUX HOTEL,

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