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Mechanised agriculture: Strategy for achieving $500b economy by 2040
As Uganda, we need to thank Museveni for promoting mechanised agriculture and also ensuring that the Government procures tractors to boost commercial farming and phase out traditional subsistence methods.
Mechanised agriculture: Strategy for achieving $500b economy by 2040
By: Admin ., Journalist @New Vision
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OPINION
By Amlan Tumusiime
Caroline Angolere, the former Kole resident district commissioner and an active National Resistance Movement (NRM) mobiliser in Karamoja sub-region, a few days ago shared a picture of herself using a hand hoe in her maize garden. She posted the picture on the national NRM senior cadres forum social media platform. This platform is administered by Gabriel Kato, a former NRM Central Executive Committee member, strong NRM cadre and a great admirer of President Yoweri Museveni. The forum has hundreds of NRM senior members, including the vice-president, prime minister, Cabinet ministers and the NRM secretary-general.
As a member of this forum, Angolere’s photograph attracted my attention, prompting me to comment that hand hoe agriculture, a traditional farming system, cannot help the Government to expand the size of the national economy to a $500b by the year 2040.
This is because hand hoe agriculture is highly time-consuming, physically exhausting and labour-intensive. Relying on manual labour prevents smallholder farmers from commercialising, causes chronic health issues like chronic back pain, and struggles to prepare hard soils compared to mechanised alternatives.
In a polite response, Angolere claimed that mechanised agriculture is only meant for the rich, including ministers, MPs and other categories of wealthy people, and the poor can only grow food crops for survival.
This is not true because the Government, through the agriculture ministry, is promoting mechanised agriculture through the provision of tractors to districts across the country. The ministry has five fully established and renovated regional agricultural mechanisation centres located across the country and supported by a central referral facility — the Namalere Agricultural Mechanisation Centre in Wakiso district.
Regional centres include Buwuma in Mpigi district, serving the central region; Agwata in Dokolo district, serving the northern region; Sanga in Kiruhura district, serving the western region, Bungokho in Mbale district, serving the eastern region and Kigumba in Kiryandongo district serving the northwestern region. These facilities are equipped with tractors, earth moving equipment, mobile workshop trucks and also provide services such as tractor maintenance and operator training.
The agriculture ministry has rolled out thousands of tractors in phases over the years to transition farmers from manual to mechanised farming. By last year, the ministry had given out about 5,000 tractors. Bunyoro sub-region alone has so far received 18 tractors.
This is because hand hoe agriculture is highly time-consuming, physically exhausting and labour-intensive. Relying on manual labour prevents smallholder farmers from commercialising, causes chronic health issues like chronic back pain, and struggles to prepare hard soils compared to mechanised alternatives.
In a polite response, Angolere claimed that mechanised agriculture is only meant for the rich, including ministers, MPs and other categories of wealthy people, and the poor can only grow food crops for survival.
This is not true because the Government, through the agriculture ministry, is promoting mechanised agriculture through the provision of tractors to districts across the country. The ministry has five fully established and renovated regional agricultural mechanisation centres located across the country and supported by a central referral facility — the Namalere Agricultural Mechanisation Centre in Wakiso district.
Regional centres include Buwuma in Mpigi district, serving the central region; Agwata in Dokolo district, serving the northern region; Sanga in Kiruhura district, serving the western region, Bungokho in Mbale district, serving the eastern region and Kigumba in Kiryandongo district serving the northwestern region. These facilities are equipped with tractors, earth moving equipment, mobile workshop trucks and also provide services such as tractor maintenance and operator training.
The agriculture ministry has rolled out thousands of tractors in phases over the years to transition farmers from manual to mechanised farming. By last year, the ministry had given out about 5,000 tractors. Bunyoro sub-region alone has so far received 18 tractors.
By the end of the financial year 2024-2025, the Government, in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organisation, had rolled out 71 tractors to the Karamoja sub-region. These include 16 standard four-wheel tractors and 55 walk-behind tractors.
Farmers countrywide are encouraged to organise themselves in groups and pay a subsidised fee under the government tractor hire scheme of only sh50,000 per acre. A private tractor owner charges between sh100,000 and sh120,000. These charges are strictly for equipment maintenance, tractor servicing and minor repairs.
Lack of information flow could be the reason why some people may not be aware of these government services available and as a result continue practicing traditional agriculture of hand hoe farming. The Government needs to update the public about the availability of such important services. I am glad the agriculture minister, Frank Tumwebaze, has been retained in this docket and Kiboga District Woman MP Desire Muhooza has been appointed state minister for agriculture. The duo are still young and can move around the country popularising the mechanisation programme, which Museveni launched in March 2019 at Namalere in Wakiso district.
Uganda possesses about 193,247sq.km of arable land, meaning roughly 80% of Uganda’s land is suitable for agriculture. Painfully, only about 35% of this available arable land is currently being actively cultivated. The Government needs to carry out research on this and the possible solutions to address it so that the country can even triple food production both for domestic consumption and export. It is possible this unutilised land is not only affecting the economy of the country, but is also a source of land conflicts.
Although Uganda uses only 35% of her arable land for agriculture, the country is able to export a variety of food crops, including beans, bananas, groundnuts, fruits and vegetables plus maize, which is the leading food export crop. For example, in the 2024-2025 financial year, Uganda exported 234,523 metric tonnes of maize valued at about $123.79m. Of course, there was a significant decline from previous seasons due to weather disruptions and erratic rainfall. The same financial year, Uganda exported an estimated 95,000 to 105,000 metric tonnes of beans, especially in the neighbouring countries.
According to a report by International Trade Administration to the Food and Agriculture Organisation, Uganda’s fertile agricultural land has the potential to feed about 200 million people. This means Uganda can feed a quarter of the East African population. The total East Africa population is 524 million people. Several African countries have significantly expanded their agricultural output and driven broader economic development by successfully transitioning to mechanised agriculture. This progress has typically been led by countries adopting specialised machinery such as tractors and direct-seeding vacuum planters. For example, Tanzania, using support from the African Development Bank Group, increased tractor and machinery use, boosting paddy rice yields. Overall agricultural credit access has seen the East African nation nearly achieve about 5.1% agriculture output growth rate as of 2025. Uganda is higher than Tanzania at 6.8%. Kenya’s agricultural output growth slowed from 4.4% in 2024 to 3.1% in 2025.
Senegal, using specialised mechanisation, especially in the northern region, using vacuum planters and advanced irrigation from the Senegal River, has helped onion farmers to triple onion yields from 30 to 100 tonnes per acre, with ground nuts remaining the key export crop.
Although Ethiopia’s main export is coffee, due to increased agricultural mechanisation, the country is also registering success in wheat production.
As Uganda, we need to thank Museveni for promoting mechanised agriculture and also ensuring that the Government procures tractors to boost commercial farming and phase out traditional subsistence methods. The issue of unutilised land or idle land should be a concern to the Government because it has so many disadvantages, including being grabbed by encroachers, missed income opportunities, financial drain and asset degradation. Idle land also promotes land fragmentation by family members, and yet land fragmentation leads to low agricultural yields, higher production costs and inefficient resource management.
I am aware of the Government’s key strategies to address idle land, including idle land taxation, land value taxes, public-private partnerships, land redistribution and tenure security and agricultural support programmes, where the Government can provide subsidies for seeds, fertilisers and irrigation to make it economically viable for rural landowners to farm previously unutilised land. Elected leaders need to mobilise people on this important aspect.
Yes, the Government can actively pursue the tenfold growth strategy of achieving a $500b gross domestic product target by 2040 through agro-industrialisation, tourism, mineral-based development, including oil and gas, science, technology and innovation, but there is also a need to utilise the almost 40% of the idle arable land for production. This will help a lot in pushing Uganda to a high middle-income status or an upper-middle-income country.
The writer is an NRM cadre
Farmers countrywide are encouraged to organise themselves in groups and pay a subsidised fee under the government tractor hire scheme of only sh50,000 per acre. A private tractor owner charges between sh100,000 and sh120,000. These charges are strictly for equipment maintenance, tractor servicing and minor repairs.
Lack of information flow could be the reason why some people may not be aware of these government services available and as a result continue practicing traditional agriculture of hand hoe farming. The Government needs to update the public about the availability of such important services. I am glad the agriculture minister, Frank Tumwebaze, has been retained in this docket and Kiboga District Woman MP Desire Muhooza has been appointed state minister for agriculture. The duo are still young and can move around the country popularising the mechanisation programme, which Museveni launched in March 2019 at Namalere in Wakiso district.
Uganda possesses about 193,247sq.km of arable land, meaning roughly 80% of Uganda’s land is suitable for agriculture. Painfully, only about 35% of this available arable land is currently being actively cultivated. The Government needs to carry out research on this and the possible solutions to address it so that the country can even triple food production both for domestic consumption and export. It is possible this unutilised land is not only affecting the economy of the country, but is also a source of land conflicts.
Although Uganda uses only 35% of her arable land for agriculture, the country is able to export a variety of food crops, including beans, bananas, groundnuts, fruits and vegetables plus maize, which is the leading food export crop. For example, in the 2024-2025 financial year, Uganda exported 234,523 metric tonnes of maize valued at about $123.79m. Of course, there was a significant decline from previous seasons due to weather disruptions and erratic rainfall. The same financial year, Uganda exported an estimated 95,000 to 105,000 metric tonnes of beans, especially in the neighbouring countries.
According to a report by International Trade Administration to the Food and Agriculture Organisation, Uganda’s fertile agricultural land has the potential to feed about 200 million people. This means Uganda can feed a quarter of the East African population. The total East Africa population is 524 million people. Several African countries have significantly expanded their agricultural output and driven broader economic development by successfully transitioning to mechanised agriculture. This progress has typically been led by countries adopting specialised machinery such as tractors and direct-seeding vacuum planters. For example, Tanzania, using support from the African Development Bank Group, increased tractor and machinery use, boosting paddy rice yields. Overall agricultural credit access has seen the East African nation nearly achieve about 5.1% agriculture output growth rate as of 2025. Uganda is higher than Tanzania at 6.8%. Kenya’s agricultural output growth slowed from 4.4% in 2024 to 3.1% in 2025.
Senegal, using specialised mechanisation, especially in the northern region, using vacuum planters and advanced irrigation from the Senegal River, has helped onion farmers to triple onion yields from 30 to 100 tonnes per acre, with ground nuts remaining the key export crop.
Although Ethiopia’s main export is coffee, due to increased agricultural mechanisation, the country is also registering success in wheat production.
As Uganda, we need to thank Museveni for promoting mechanised agriculture and also ensuring that the Government procures tractors to boost commercial farming and phase out traditional subsistence methods. The issue of unutilised land or idle land should be a concern to the Government because it has so many disadvantages, including being grabbed by encroachers, missed income opportunities, financial drain and asset degradation. Idle land also promotes land fragmentation by family members, and yet land fragmentation leads to low agricultural yields, higher production costs and inefficient resource management.
I am aware of the Government’s key strategies to address idle land, including idle land taxation, land value taxes, public-private partnerships, land redistribution and tenure security and agricultural support programmes, where the Government can provide subsidies for seeds, fertilisers and irrigation to make it economically viable for rural landowners to farm previously unutilised land. Elected leaders need to mobilise people on this important aspect.
Yes, the Government can actively pursue the tenfold growth strategy of achieving a $500b gross domestic product target by 2040 through agro-industrialisation, tourism, mineral-based development, including oil and gas, science, technology and innovation, but there is also a need to utilise the almost 40% of the idle arable land for production. This will help a lot in pushing Uganda to a high middle-income status or an upper-middle-income country.
The writer is an NRM cadre