THE New Vision offers a chance to its online readers to discuss topical issues via the Discussion Board. This weekâ€™s topic is; Despite the fact that the country is a net exporter of food, there are reports of famine in different parts of the country. What should be done to address this imbalance?

Adopt sustainable farming
Much as climate change is responsible for famine, we cannot solely blame it for the perennial famine that we are experiencing. In some regions, abject poverty causes perennial famine. A family cultivates and sells crops for money to meet its multitude of needs.

The Government should, therefore, through the appropriate agencies, help communities to adopt farming practices that increase farm yields. With increase farm yields, the Government should enforce food security practices like having food reserves in each sub-county. This used to be the case in many areas at Independence.

The Bona Baggagawale (Prosperity-for-All) programme concept should be reformulated into a scheme that reaches the rural poor and not their representatives.
Emmanuel Otim eotim@yahoo.co.uk)

Government subsidies needed
In Japan where rice is harvested once a year, the government supports local farmers through subsidies to ensure that every farmer plants rice during the planting season. This in turn results into big harvests which the government purchases from farmers each year and stores to cater for emergencies and calamities like earth-quakes.

Similarly, the Government should introduce a system whereby farmers who live in rich agricultural lands are encouraged to plant crops and ensure no field is left bare. It can also embark on village educational farming programmes and farming assistants recruited to manage it.
Benon Bainomugisha
benmug@yahoo.com

Better planning is key
Could famine be arising out of lack of planning in the wider policy programmes? We need buffer stocks, disaster funds and procedures to address unplanned eventualities. We should also develop and improve access to agriculture modernisation.
Patrick Kwesiga
patrickkwesiga@yahoo.co.uk

Build national food silos
Building silos to store the food in times of shortage will help regulate the prices for farmers and evenout distribution and supply of produce. Silos can be built at different locations determined by statisticians and based on the population.
Robert Kuloba docaporg@yahoo.com

Political solution required
Drought is the major trigger of countless famines in Africa. Other natural causes of famine are floods, locusts, livestock or crop diseases. Famines in the recent years are caused by a combination of natural triggers, as well as manmade triggers such as social, political and economic conflict, inefficient transport and market infrastructure, government policies. But is famine an event or process? Features such as drought, floods, epidemics, market failure, and wars make famines an event and can easily be addressed but may not necessarily be the only cause of famine.

Processes such as government policies, climate change, poverty, depict famine as a process but they too on their own may not define the underlying causes of famine. At the centre of almost all famine is production failure, be it through drought or conflict.

Problems with agricultural production are of an economic nature and require economic solutions, while famine in Uganda today is political and will require political solutions.
Peace Nganwa peank13@yahoo.co.uk

Resort to Ujamaa (brotherhood)
Mwalimu Julius Nyerereâ€™s spirit of Ujamaa in Tanzania should guide us in dealing with the famine problem. Nyerere held that nobody should become rich at the expense of the other.

The spirit of individualism is prominent in Uganda. But we should care for each other and not rely on donors. If surplus food is collected from areas of plenty and distributed to those who do not have, the famine problem would decrease.

Our country has enough to feed its population comfortably but problems arise when individuals serve to their own interests. The Ujamaa spirit emphasises the spirit of solidarity. It is about time we adopted it.
Francis Sereka selfransio@yahoo.com

All must work to end famine
Ujamaa or socialism is not applicable in the 21st Century. It encourages laziness and limits the full expression of human imagination, creativity and entrepreneurship.

Individualism is the way forward.
The technical word is, capitalism. One can adjust the term to include societal or communist capitalism. Everything and all should work for profit. People should be creative and ingenuous with agrotechnology, and not living off others for nothing.
Wabomba
wabomba@hotmail.com

Revive granaries
Long ago, it was a requirement that homes had granaries which were stocked with dried foodstuffs for a rainy day. In my home area, the reserve food in granaries could take our family through two bad years.

Unfortunately, people now sell everything they cannot immediately consume, leading to famine and other disasters. The Government could revive the use of granaries through the use of local councillors who would ensure that no family sells foodstuffs unless they have enough reserves to see them through at least one bad year.

The Government could also warn the public against having more children than they can look after. There is a limit to how many people our soils can support, especially under peasant methods of famine.

Food reserves, population control and development of infrastructure, therefore, are the solution to the famine problem.
Erarakit001@yahoo.co.uk

Utilise food planting seasons
We need to have policies to ensure distribution of food from one part of the country to another.
At one time, Tamale Mirundi, the Presidentâ€™s press secretary, asked what Ugandan leaders learn or at least see when they visit foreign countries? Africa has two food growing seasons but we cannot harness our natural resources. We must make the most of the opportunities we have.
Kayemba
salokaye@yahoo.com

Better environment management
Famine is not unique to Uganda since the whole world is hungry and may continue to be if the population continues to grow. Climate changes continue to cause extended rainfall, hence floods.

But uncontrolled food exports (quotas), lack of State and private food reserves, lack of new methods of farming, encroaching of the Sahara Desert, a pre-dorminantly illiterate and poor population, pests and disease, and lack of self-reliance policies have led to famine. If we can tackle those issues better, then we can improve on our food situation.

Africa, like Asia, could domesticate some wildlife after being licensed properly so as to increase its food supply during famine.

Lakes such as Victoria can be saved from â€œAnthropogenic Eutrophication, which has a negative ecological and aesthetic impact.â€ This would intensify and increase the species of fresh-water biology, we can harvest. The means are available but we need to apply them responsibly. Uganda is naturally endowed. If we took advantage of this, we would create make significant strides in fighting famine.
Beddy
beddy@td-edinstvo.ru