Posted on August, 2, 2021 at 09:08 am
Songea. The government has promised to reform the Warehouse Receipt System (WRS) with the objective of ending grievances of farmers.
Agriculture deputy minister Hussein Bashe revealed the plan on Thursday in Songea at a meeting of agriculture stakeholders during which the system was blamed as impeding the development of farmers in Ruvuma.
The other challenges pointed out include shortage of funds, unpaid agents debts, shortage of quality seeds, low maize prices, uncompleted warehouse projects, shortage of agricultural inputs, high competition in transporting cereals and conning of farmers.
Mr Bashe was the chief guest during the meeting as he continues with his tour to assess the situation on the ground, inspecting the implementation of government promises and addressing challenges raised by farmers.
Speaking at the meeting, Mr Bashe said the ministry plans to dispatch a team of experts to discuss transformation measures. The team would meet the WRS director general, the chief of the Tanzania Cooperative Development Commission (TCDC), as well as representatives from local councils, cooperative unions and farmers.
“The experts will suggest a new WRS model, and determine the fate of the Sh10 million paid as security for crop buyers to participate in soya auctions, as well as other amounts payable for a similar purpose,” he said.
He said the WRS would collaborate with local authorities to establish points of sales and ensure such facilities made use of scales instead of traditional measurements that exploit farmers. “The new system will ensure that crops are sold at a single point and quality assurance measures are adhered to because the same seriously threatens the country’s competition in the international market,” he said.
He said soya and peas would no longer be traded through the WRS in order to pave the way for the crops to mature.
The system would fully engage crop agents whose maturity will enable them to strike big deals in the international markets, according to him.
“The government is committed to transforming the country’s agriculture to make it commercial farming,” he said.
He urged agents to formalize their activities so they would be recognized by authorities, saying they would not be evicted from the system saying the government believed in the vibrant public private partnership.
According to him, WRS director general Asagye Bangu had been instructed to supervise the registration of all warehouses countrywide and making possible automations in order to increase efficiency of the system.
Regarding agricultural financing and involvement of the Tanzania Agriculture Development Bank (TADB) and the Private Agricultural Sector Support (PASS), it was surprisingly noted that such entities has no offices in the major cereals producing region of Ruvuma!
“This doesn’t make sense because farmers are now forced to be served through the TADB zonal offices located in Mbeya,” he said pledging to talk to the financial institutions.
He said interests for loans secured by farmer also need to be regulated to as low as 15 percent, not that they had agreed in principle that it should be below the said amount.
Mr Bashe promised to take and work on the ongoing tradition of banks preparing lending contracts in English.
Unpaid agents
Mr Bashe said after the government had completed paying seedlings producers, it was now the time for contractors of subsidized agricultural inputs to receive their payments, saying his ministry was finalizing the verification process.
“However, stakeholders with fabricated claims should forget about receiving a single shilling during the payment,” he said.
Shortage of quality seeds
He said while the government process to import quality seeds was underway, it has intensified plans produce better seeds locally, noting that the Agricultural Seeds Agency (Asa) had been hundreds of hectares of land in Namtumbo that was owned Tanzania Agricultural Research Institute (Tari) for quality seeds production.
“Plans are underway to provide to the private sector, another abandoned land that belonged to the National Agriculture and Food Corporation (Nafco) for production of sunflower, soyabeans and sesame seeds,” said the deputy minister.
While uncompleted warehouse construction projects would be completed according to availability of funds, high prices of agricultural inputs was another challenge which is dealt by the ministry in collaboration with the Finance and Planning ministry. Regarding high competition in transportation tendering processes, Mr Bashe said the responsibilities should be effectively given to individuals and companies from the region.
“The issue surrounding farmers who were coined during the maize trading exercise, registration should be done at the district commissioner’s office pending the ongoing case,” he said, declining to make any commitment.
Stakeholders’ concerns
Speaking during the event, CCM regional chairperson Odo Mwisho said hiked fertilizers prices was a serious concern among farmers giving the example of urea which is being sold at Sh87,000, up from Sh55,000 last season. “If this trend continues, farmers will be discouraged,” he said.
Ms Jacqueline Msongozi (Ruvuma constituency Special Seats MP-CCM) said the need for high quality sesame, sunflower and soya seeds is crucial.
Songea District Commissioner Pololet Mgema said time was ripe for completing construction of warehouses projects to maintain the quality of produced cereals has come.
A farmer, Mr Baltazar Komba, said victims of maize procured at Sh70,000 per bag and later selling at Sh40,000 were still struggling to get their rights, and requested interventions.
Crops buyer Mugisha Rukaza said the WRS subjected buyers to serious challenges, including the threat of economic sabotage, and the Sh10 million deposit as security to enable stakeholders participate in auctions.
Rukaza was supported in this by Mr Joseph Komba who described the Warehouse Receipt System as “a failure,” if only because it was hurting farmers as a result of the rapid decrease in the prices for some major crops.
Source: The Citizen