29.8.11

If most Africans work in the Agricultural sector, how come it has to Import so much Food?

If you follow world news, you must have seen the so many pictures of malnourished children that are playing on all the major news channels every year. This year, they especially mention the drought in Somalia, East Africa, Sudan, Congo. Presently, there is a raging drought in East Africa which is currently dubbed the "worst humanitarian disaster in the world" which is threatening to engulf the whole region. The World Food Programme expects 10 million people to require food assistance.

70% of the population in Africa lives on agriculture and yet, every year, millions of Africans starve to death. This encyclopedia on earth article states that Africa spends between $15,000 - $20,000 million on food imports annually (which figure has probably gone up since 2007). Africa spends this on top of the $2,000 million food aid that it annually receives. This is surely a big sum of money that can be used to promote large scale farming instead of the hand-to-mouth farming practiced by African farmers.

Uganda agricultural problem

In Uganda, farmers always produce a surplus - which the Uganda president Museveni boosts about. The problem is that the farmers sell it only at the local market where the same surplus produce is so abundantly available.

For instance, tomatoes may have a big demand therefore selling very highly that season. The following season every farmer plants tomatoes for sale which creates a huge surplus the following harvesting season, consequently plummeting the prices of tomatoes to near zero that season. This discourages the farmer from growing any more tomatoes. When the prices of tomatoes rise due to shortage the following season, the farmer does not benefit anything since no one has grown any tomatoes to sell.

This sort of pattern keeps playing out in areas all over the country. There are regions prominent for growing mangoes, maize, rice, tomatoes, bananas... etc. No wonder this has created a belief among the youth that agriculture is the least profitable business one can have.

The huge price fluctuations therefore, are partly to blame why African farmers cannot grow enough food to feed the whole continent, and billions of dollars are spent on importing food to one of the richest agricultural continents in the world.

What can a young farmer do?

  • Uganda government has put aside money in the 2011 budget to build huge silos and warehouses to store agricultural produce in proper conditions so that it doesn't not rot or get fungi. A young farmer should also look into setting up a storage facility at home for cash crops like maize and coffee. 
  • The government can easily put in place a price support system for farmers - to guarantee a minimum price for the farmers and wipe out the huge price fluctuations that destroy the market and discourage many farmers. 
  • Join a young farmers group to collectively bargain for a better price for their produce instead of selling it individually on the local markets.
  • Also young farmers should be alert to changing market prices. A very good way is to utilise ICT tools to boost an agricultural business article.
Leave your comments below on what you think of the African food shortage problem.

Read more:

27.8.11

Low Quality Farming Materials affecting Youth Farmers and their Solutions

Low quality tools, seeds and farming methods are affecting farmers' yields alot more today especially in Uganda. For instance, the Daily Monitor reports that there are a lot of fake seedlings and diseased plant seedlings being sold on the market today.

26.8.11

10 Ways A Youth can use ICTs to Boost his or her Agribusiness

As a young farmer, your agricultural business should be much better than that of your parents. You should be producing more than they did, earning more, employing more people on your farm, and thinking beyond using a hoe to till the land!

Your parents lived much of their productive lives in the 20th century without much access to the knowledge and tools available to the youth today. They lived during a troubled period while today is more stable and calm for agricultural production.

Here are 10 ways to use Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) to improve and boost the performance of your agricultural business. From Wikipedia, ICTs as a general term for all kinds of technologies which enable users to create, access and manipulate information.

Here are 10 ways to improve a young farmer's business using freely available ICT tools:

1. Use free & opensource software
Forget using windows. Even if you are using a version of windows XP/Vista/7 which you got from your friend for free, you are not safe from malware, spyware and deadly computer viruses! These can greatly cost your agricultural business alot of money in form of constantly buying antivirus programs which never work.

Instead turn to using Ubuntu which is free to download and use and above all free from computer viruses. There is also alot of support for it online if you encounter problems. It comes with openoffice which has free word processing, spreadsheets, powerpoint and browsers for browsing the Internet. 

2. Using free blogging / website platforms to write online
  • blogger - www.blogger.com - easier to use and provided by Google
  • wordpress - www.wordpress.com
  • tumblr - www.tumblr.com
Use these free services to constantly update your audience on the activities on your farm. If you are growing matooke, do not be shy from writing numerous articles on how to grow matooke, cook matooke, trade in matooke etc.

3. Use Skype to call abroad Free
this is the most widely used software on the Internet to call and talk to business partners, donors, friends abroad. Skype-to-skype computer calls are free of charge. Use this to communicate instead of the expensive mobile telecom providers.

4. Free marketing tools to promote your agricultural business. You can use facebook or social networking, sending direct emails to your friends, blogging, weblinks, participate in agricultural online forums, place Ads on your website as some forms of online marketing.

Your agricultural business gets known the world over hence increasing traffic and business. Marketing & selling using TV or sales people is expensive & not affordable to most young farmers.

5. Do not be a jack of all trades and master of none which makes you very tired, inefficient and ineffective. Concentrate on what you do best and outsource the rest of the other activities.

For instance, if your typing speed is slow (2 words per minute), don't insist on typing a 10 page proposal document even if you have your own computer. Go down to the Internet cafe and have the attendant type it for you at a little fee. You will get back your document much sooner and you will have more time to work on something else.

6. Organise business activities
in a way to cut Travel and meetings costs. Use your phone, email address, websites, videos to reach your clients. Physically traveling away from your agricultural business often makes it unavailable. Travel only if you must.

7. Use Mobile Money services - all major telcom providers do have mobile money receiving and payment services. Make it very easy for your customers to trade with you by making sure your mobile phone is registered to receive mobile payments. In Uganda, MTN mobile money, Airtel, Orange, warid are all reported to be offering this service.

8. Sign up to receive daily market information from services such as FOODNET. Newspapers and radio are also a good source of market information. You could also use your mobile phone to subscribe to agricultural information services. Make sure to record the trend of the agricultural products you are interested in. Over time, you will always know where the most demand for your products are.

9. Join the national government body of farmers or it's equivalent - this is very important. Through the national farmer's body, the government channels all funds and support towards improving the livelihoods of farmers. As a young, vibrant and ambitious farmer, active participation would easily place you in reach of such resources. In Uganda, such a body is NAADS, the local chamber of commerce or the SACCOs.

10. Post your agricultural Produce online -  There are a number of websites online where you could post agricultural produce to sell. Some of these are below
  • Google Trader - its free to post items for sell. You can access it on your mobile phone too.
  • Facebook Marketplace - Post whatever you are selling. You have an audience of over 500 million people! You need to join facebook to post.
  • Use your facebook status to post agricultural products you are selling
  • Email friends about products you have and if they know anyone who can buy from you. Use your phone to call if possible.
  • Webbiz Africa, Mukatale, the eye Magazine - these are all websites with large audiences that you can use to market your produce.
  • Join the fair trade foundation - to reach European markets and sell in tonnes of agricultural products.
From experience, these methods have worked for us. We keep on using them everyday. What is the experience in your country? Please share with us in the comments below.

Leave us a comment below.

Read more:

25.8.11

Young Farmers Cry of Lack of Capital - Here is Free Seed Capital

Many young farmers who are looking at earning an income through agriculture have "lack of capital" as their number one problem. Capital, they often mean is the seed money to start operations or expand their business.

Let us take a case study from a DENIVA report:

A youth farmer group in Ullepi subcounty of Arua district had Shs: 360,000 in their account (from member contributions). The group had 20 beehives, 10 from the Integrated Farmer Support Group (IFSG) of NAADS as seed capital (internal resource mobilisation), and another 10 from a PMA grant. Their own funds of Shs; 360,000 would enable them purchase another 10 beehives.
A hive yields about 12-15 kilogrammes of honey each at Shs 1,100 per kilogram for the previous season and has no other major input, when compared for example with crop production.


Against these facts the same youthful farmers are crying that their major problem is lack of capital!

Using the Ullepi youth farmers group as an example, below are ways how they can solve the lack of capital problem:

1. Members - Encourage more youth to join the youth farmers group with a paid membership. This will increase the amount of money in their account which can be used to buy more beehives or to add value to the quality of honey sold by the youth group. And the members group can invest in planting macadamia trees which produce the most expensive nuts very much sought around the world.

2. Skills of members - All the youth members in this group have different skills which can be tapped towards the progress of youth group. For instance some members could be skilled in using computers & Internet - hence they can help group with setting up websites, writing reports and training their peers to use computers, just like these 5 ways to make recurring income in Agriculture.

This way, the farmers group can develop much faster without unnecessary external spending. Members should fill a form where they fill in their skills, experience and level of expertise.

3. Business plan - this can clearly layout the financial position and future path that the youth in this group want to take. For instance, in a year there are 2 honey harvesting seasons. With the beehives producing to capacity, all beehives would yield (20 beehives x15kg x 2 =600kg of honey). An income of 600kg x 1,100/= would make the group 660,000/= richer!

4. Loans from bank - An organized youth farmers group asking for a loan with a clear business plan stands a great chance of receiving the money they ask for. This is easier now in Uganda considering that the government is trying to support the youth groups than before.

5. Sell to areas where honey is in high demand - For instance, in Kampala, 500grams of honey cost shs. 5,000/= If this youth farmer's group can transport the honey to Kampala, they would be making 10,000/= per kilo. This would leave them with an income of 600kg x shs. 10,000 = shs. 6,000,000!!

6. Add more value to the harvested honey
- Adding value to the honey can be as simple as extracting it from the honeycomb and filtering it. Also it can be nice packed in small 500grams plastic bottles and sold in local supermarkets. And the food waste from harvesting honey can be turned into fertilizers, wax and other products.

7. Extra services - The young farmer's group can consider offering other services to its members and the community at large. For instance, the group can set up classes on successful beehive farming, extracting propolis - very good cure of many diseases and illness, consultancy services on bee farming, workshops & seminars. These would contribute a steady income to the group including offering jobs to some members of this youth group. Here are 20 Ways to Make $25,000 per month running an Agricultural Business.

Beyond producing honey, insect farming is becoming popular for insect protein that is a highly demanded input in animal and poultry feeds. Are you a young farmer's group? What is your experience? Please share with us your experience about keeping beehive and combating poverty in your area.

Leave us a comment

Read more:

23.8.11

Youth Earning a Living through Agriculture

I have been privileged to travel through Uganda, Tanzania and Kenya not on holiday working with different non-profit organizations working to promote the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) among the youth.

Organizations worthy of mentioning include ALIN-EA, Tanzania Telecentre network (a network of local telecenters sharing knowledge and experiences on improving their rural communities using ICTs) and a number of other here in Uganda. All of these organizations are keen on empowering the youth with ICT knowledge and tools to improve their well-being.

This blog is therefore an opportunity to highlight the numerous experiences that the youth who are especially engaged in farming are using ICTs to promote their own living standards and those of their families.

Leave us a comment