By Veneranda Sumila,
BusinessWeek Reporter (The Citizen)
*Dar es Salaam*. Tanzania business farmers and traders have immense
opportunities to trade in the East Africa Common Market if the country
comes with specific reforms in its existing policies.
Though the government has high regard towards agriculture but experts say
the country lacks coherence towards policy harmonization, enforcement of
legislation and streamlining administrative procedures.
“It is difficult for Tanzanians to compete to the EACM because the country
has not prepared itself to do business with other countries instead it
concentrates on internal business,” said Tanzania Exporters Association
Executive Director Mtemi Naluyaga.
He said that Tanzania has not identified its competitive advantage to the
East Africa Community hence lacks proper plans on how to compete to the
EACM.
According to Naluyaga if Tanzania use effectively its existing productive
land it will be able to increase its exports to neighboring countries.
“But currently there are many restrictions that discourage farmers from
cultivating more, for a person to export anything he needs an export permit
which is not easy to obtain one,” said Mr Nluyaga.
According to him while locals are denied export permits many foreigners
especially Kenyans come and buy cheaply our agriculture products and cross
the border unnoticed.
He said that last month alone more than 50000 tons of maize at Kibaigwa
market were bought by Kenya traders and were exported, but there is no any
data that shows a certain amount crossing the border.
“This is a sickening factor especially when one notes that there is no
Tanzanian who can buy grains from Kenya,” he said.
However, a report titled Technical Assessment of Progressive Implementation
of the East African Common Market Protocol reveals that the major and
critical factor that remains not fully addressed for the country to compete
in the EACM is education.
“The masses engaged in the Agricultural Value Chain (AVC) are potentially
illiterate! This means it is difficult to make agriculture business
competitive,” says a report which is
According to the report, no adoption of technology or impact of general
knowledge can be achieved in this kind of a situation and it accounts for
the risk averse attitude by almost all the financial institutions towards
financing agriculture.
Consequently according to the report, in the absence of an agricultural
bank or fund as an alternative plays down the high potential and
competitiveness of Tanzanian agriculture.
Tanzania is in crisis with regard to quality of basic education, most chain
actors on the supply side including producers on farms, traders and
transporters have basic education (STD VII).
Facts put it clear that most primary school leavers do not know how to read
and write.
“The condition of primary education in Tanzania is pathetic to the extent
that it is difficult to absorb primary school leavers in modern agriculture
since it is based on value addition and improved technology,” says the
report.
It is a fact that workers who have received little formal education can
carry out only simple manual tasks and find it much more difficult to adapt
to more advanced production processes and techniques, and therefore
contribute less to come up with or execute innovations.
Lack of basic education among the masses engaged in agriculture
significantly has constrained business development in Tanzania.
According to experts it is difficult to move up the value chain by
producing more sophisticated or value-intensive products with existing
human resources.
“It is extremely essential for the Tanzanian government to avoid
significant reductions in resource allocation to education sector as it is
critical area, in spite of the fact that government budgets will need to be
cut to reduce the deficits and debt burden,” says the report.
The Agricultural Sector Review 2009/10 report discloses that most small
scale agro-processors have not been provided with adequate training on
processing skills due to scarcity of qualified agroprocessing trainers; and
that a number of investment projects are not implemented on time due to
inadequate technical personnel to supervise them.
“For instance, with regard to irrigation infrastructure, there are hardly
qualified irrigation engineers in districts to supervise irrigation
development schemes,” says the report.
According to the report, skills of staff in institutions involved in trade
as regulators and enforcement agents of policies, legislations and
standards should be enhanced and oriented to cater for competitive business
settings that shall enable agricultural produce trade to thrive.
“TCCIA should attempt to build capacity of both its staff in districts and
the District Council to facilitate trade under the EACM conditions,” says
the report.
According to the report, TCCIA in collaboration with Tanzania Bureau of
Standards (TBS) and other regulatory agencies should arrange and avail
Public education on applicable policies, legislations and standards for
agricultural produce.
TCCIA should organize traders, transporters and producers in business clubs
to be targeted for training on how to utilize the immense opportunities
lying with the EACM.
“The intervention should aim at enabling them identify one another not as
competitors but collaborate and complement one another and share business
information freely,” says the report.
The attitude of government officials towards business and private sector
ought to change since it is only through trade the country can create
decent employment for the militant youth.
“According to the findings made in this study the public officials are not
sensitized to recognize the role business and its contribution to the
growth of national economy. Training is required to impart them
entrepreneurial virtues and skills,” says the report, which was financed by
BEST AC.
But Mr Naluyaga urges the government to formulate an export policy so as to
encourage exports.
“Our country has no export policy, instead it relies much on its trade
policy, formulation of an export policy will stimulate the performance of
Tanzania on regional trade”