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Where to start on agrarian reforms?
2006-06-28 08:48:27
By Editor
The ongoing debating euphoria in the august Parliament refocused its earth-shattering attention on the need for nationwide agrarian reforms at the beginning of the week.
The arguments centred on the truism that farming sector is the mainstay of the economy.
Hence, its improvement would directly benefit the more than 80 per cent Tanzanians directly or indirectly eking livelihood from agriculture.
Over the past 40 years or so, various experiments on agrarian reforms have been implemented, such as villagilisation, nationalization, subsidization of key farm inputs like fertiliser, creation of agro-input guarantee fund, training farm experts and the like.
On top of these, strategic agricultural policies have been formulated and overhauled over time, with good intentions.
Close to half century down the date line, we are poor simply because country’s economic bastion has not been improving, despite the various domestic and international efforts seeking to uplift its contribution to total economic growth rate.
So, what has gone wrong? Did we miss the inspiration of the magic bullet at the level of policy formulation or implementation strategies went awry?
Could someone guess what should have been the best starting point towards effective agrarian reforms?
It appears that since attempts to liberalise the economy kicked-off from early 1980s, too much attention has focused on fiscal measures, such as subsidies on input, export guarantee schemes and land banking, in the hope that eventually farm productivity and rural incomes would perk up.
We have got less articulated policies on access to modern farm technology, human expertise and public agricultural research institutions, as well as monetary policies that are supportive of large-scale investment in agriculture.
At the very micro-level, we are missing out on even strengthening some of the best traditional irrigation and storage technologies which have a direct bearing on farm incomes and livelihoods.
One wonders why our groceries are flooded with imported foodstuffs most of which are domestically produced. That tells the missing link of a strong small and medium scale enterprises (SMEs) which could process, package and provide supplies to both local and export markets.
These are some of the challenges facing agrarian reforms in Tanzania. Probably, for the sake of planning, district authorities should identify their specific and basic farm reform needs and sell the requirements to the private sector, the donor community, the civil society and even the central government.
Experience shows the bottom-up approach yields lasting results much more efficiently.
For instance, a greater part of Kilosa District in Morogoro Region or the whole Rufiji River basin are naturally fertile to the extent that they do not immediately need the application of chemical fertilizer.
An immediate challenge is how to develop a strategy for developing and applying compost manure which is both less expensive and harmful to the soil.
We should not surrender even if we hit some snags along the way. Nobody would wish to quarrel with a crocodile while the feet are still in water.
The locus of Tanzania’s poverty is found in rural areas. Unless agrarian reforms are implemented seriously, our dreams of attaining even one of the Millennium Development Goals would be a practical joke.
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