Anti-poverty campaign paying off

When President Yoweri Museveni launched a country-wide anti-poverty campaigns, skeptics passed it off as political campaigns. To prove the detractors of his camping wrong, he camped at his Kawumu demonstration farm in Luweero riding his bicycle and watered his banana planted with plastic bottles.

When pictures of such activities were published, a section of public attacked the President for employing such primitive ways of farming instead of modern farming ways. A year later, he was a happy farmer harvesting what he had planted.

Such simple and affordable methods gave Ugandans courage to ‘copy and paste' and there have been testimonies on that.

FUNDING SACCOS

Museveni said the Government has allocated more funds to intensify the fight against household poverty in the country through the formation of different Savings and Credit Cooperative Organisations (SACCOS) that will manage the funds in their respective areas.

"We are going to add more funds which will be given to specialised groups. What you have to do is to form SACCOS according to your  speciality and manage your funds," he said.

The President who was addressing leaders in Ankole and wananchi to sensitise them on the wealth and job creation campaign with a view to helping households in the country to banish poverty.

The President said the Government is going to replicate what has been done in parts of Kampala of providing common user facilities in all zones in the country in order to help youth groups generate income for their families through manufacturing. He noted that the country has continued to import from China and other countries despite the abundant resources that Uganda is endowed wealth.

"Uganda is rich but imports from China. To fight poverty, we have to produce from here," he stressed.

Museveni emphasised the need for leaders to take up the responsibility of sensitising people in their respective areas on the methods to employ to fight against household poverty.

He said the economic battle should be everyone's responsibility where wananchi have to work for both food and income security to be able to meet their money demands.

COMMERCIAL FARMING

He disclosed that all efforts have been directed at development so that the 68% of the Ugandans, who are still wallowing in substance farming are assisted to embrace modern-day commercial production.

He noted that the population who are in subsistence farming do not contribute to the development of the country yet demand services such as health, among others. He, therefore, called on the people to engage in modern commercial farming President Museveni noted NRM has registered development in the country but asked the people appreciate the need to differentiate development from wealth creation.

He explained that while development is outside and is for everybody, wealth is on the individual basis and affects a family. Museveni's demonstration farms are located in Kawumu Luweero district, Kityerere in Mayuge district and Gili Gili on the outskirts of Arua town.

"In the Bible, Jesus after his resurrection showed himself to the disciples but one of them Thomas could not believe until he touched his scars, some of you have been doubting; Now the next two months I will invite you to touch my scars on that farm," Museveni said referring to the produce that was about to harvest from Kawumu  farm.

"I am going to be a rich man using the same soil and water of Arua when you are always complaining of poverty. In Luwero on only half an acre, I now get sh64m annually,e," he said.



FOUR-ACRE PLAN

According to the 2002 population census, agriculture employs 68% of Uganda's population and about 80% of this lies under subsistence farming. Agriculture, being the biggest employer of the population, should be used to grow the economy and also better the lives of our people.

Luckily, many of our people have woken up to the presidential call for people to prosper through agriculture. It is against that background that President Museveni is advocating for a robust approach towards agriculture.

Under the four-acre programme, one acre is used for cash crops, say colonal coffee. Four-hundredand-fifty seedlings are planted at a cost of sh500 each, amounting to sh22,500. At maturity, each coffee plant yields between 5-7kg of coffee. If sold unprocessed, it would earn the farmer between sh9m and 12.6m, annually.

Another acre of land is allocated to fruit production, for example mangoes. Thirty-three seedlings at a cost of sh4,000 each amounts to shs132,000. After maturity, the farmer harvests an average of 800 fruits from each mango tree and if sold in a local market at sh500 per fruit, the farmer reaps an average of sh21m annually.

Another acre is used for dairy production on which, for example, pasture (elephant grass, legume and others) can be grown and one dairy cow kept. On average, a Friesian Holstein cow will produce 20 litres of milk daily. If five litres are consumed by the family and 15 litres are sold at sh1,200 per litre, the farmer fetches sh2m annually.

The last one acre is used for growing of food crops such as maize, beans, ground nuts, cassava and others. On this acre, the farmer should maximize the benefit of inter-cropping to ensure maximum yields. This should common with legumes that help in fixing the soil with nitrogen, inter-cropped with other plants at a given rate and design as recommended by experts.

On top of the above, the farmer can engage in backyard enterprises such as apiculture, mushroom-growing, and freerange chicken rearing. These don't need much capital but have enormous benefits. The benefits are very encouraging. Such a farmer is capable of earning over sh35m annually with low economic input.

This farming model is capable of solving 90% of problems that are facing our farming communities. On the four acres of land, these enterprises are interdependent where the cow can produce manure for the farming activities as well as the coffee husks to address the challenge of low fertiliser use and poor soil conditions.



Farmers with such income flowing their way will be capable of hiring private agriculture experts to run their farming businesses professionally. There will be an increase in production of coffee which is our current major agricultural export. Then there is emergence of small scale industries at local levels for value-addition and bulk marketing to avoid wastage during periods of plenty.

The approach should be  encouraged and quickly adopted. Some of the crops don't need recurrent attention, planting materials and intensive weeding. Also important to note is the abundant time the farmer enjoys engaging in other productive activities as well as leisure.