Caritas Uganda: Small-scale farmers should be professionalised not excluded by big industrial farms.

Paul Samasumo – Vatican City.

Based on the conviction that food security will not be enhanced by promoting industrial agriculture, Caritas Uganda is building three agricultural academies where small-scale farmers can be taught different modules that will increase their efficiency, protitability and marketing skills. After their courses, the farmers will be monitored for progress.

Small farmers have lost land to big corporates

Reacting to a global movement pushing the slogan to ‘Feeding 10 billion people by 2050,’ Fr Muheezangango expressed scepticism about the role of few transnational corporate farms coming to developing countries under the guise of boosting food production.

“I know that some capitalists are looking to taking over land from small-scale farmers or peasant farmers so that they get the mandate to grow food to feed the globe, come 2050. I think it is a bad ambition because it is dehumanising and stops people from working for themselves. I think God created us and wants us to work for ourselves. If people want to grow food for us because the world population is booming, I think this is wrong. It is not being done with the motive of providing food but rather with the motive of getting more money for themselves. Small-scale farmers have lost land to these corporates and in most cases, the food grown does not even stay in the country to feed the nation. They take it away and sell it. The money does not come back to the country as stated. I think that is a bad motive,” he reiterated.

People must seek their own development

Fr Muheezangango stressed the fact that God created and wants human beings to work for themselves and seek their own development. “Sometimes we take development to people. People should look for the kind of development they need,” he insisted.

He continued, “As Caritas Uganda, we designed a programme that we are calling the Professionalisation of Small-Scale Farmers. To this end, we are building three academies where small-scale farmers will come, pay something reasonable to be enrolled in the various programmes and then they can pick a module that interests them. Alternatively, they can choose to follow the entire course. They then go back to their farms to put into practice what they have learned. And we will monitor them for progress,” said they Uganda Caritas Director.

According to FAO, nearly three quarters of Ugandans earn a living from agriculture. The sector is dominated by small-scale farmers. It is responsible for 25% to the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Yet many small-scale farmers continue to live below the national poverty line.