Photo: President Samia Suluhu Hassan speaking to TFRA Board Chairperson, Dr Anthony Diallo at Nzuguni grounds in Dodoma during Farmers Day, known as Nane nane
President Samia tells TFRA
to continue serving farmers improve their lives
By Mutayoba Arbogast
The President of the United Republic of Tanzania, Dr. Samia Suluhu Hassan has launched a programme of Title Deed farmer smart cards to farmers who meet the criteria.
The inauguration took place on August 8, 2024 during the peak of the Nane nane Farmers’ Day held at Nzuguni grounds in Dodoma whereby she congratulated Tanzania Fertilizer Regulatory Authority (TFRA), for its good work and asked it to continue serving farmers.
The smart card ID that proves legal rights to own a piece of land, is connected to various systems such as NIDA, Land, Bank and subsidy inputs that will enable the farmer to get various financial services such as issuing and depositing money in the bank, receiving payment for the sale of crops, insurance services including health insurance.
Inspecting the exemplary plots prepared by Central province regions of Singida Dodoma and Manyara, the Minister of Agriculture Hussein Bashe explained that the plots have been served with both, imported fertilizers and those produced in the country to help farmers get rid of the concept that fertilizers produced in the country are of low quality.
“Now, through these plots, farmers have learnt with their eyes that the crops cultivated and served with fertilizers produced in the country have flourished well, unlike their beliefs”, he said.
Speaking on behalf of all farmers in the country, the TFRA Board Chairperson, Dr. Anthony Diallo expressed gratitude for the decisions to implement the subsidy fertilizer program starting from the 2022/2023 and 2023/2024 farming seasons, and for agreeing to continue providing the subsidy until the 2025/2026 farming season.
He said, the program has had positive results for farmers and the agricultural sector in general.
Explaining the productivity resulting from the implementation of the program, Dr. Diallo said, production productivity has increased from 17,148,290 tons in 2021/2022 to 20,402,014 tons in 2022/2023.
In addition, the use of fertilizers in the country has increased from 363,000 tons in the 2021/2022 agricultural season to 840,000 tons in the 2023/2024 agricultural season.
“We expect the use of fertilizers to increase further to reach 1,000,000 tons by the end of the 2024/2025 season. This exceeds the Abuja goals set by African countries in 2006, where they agreed that the use of fertilizers should reach 50 kg per hectare by 2025”, said Diallo
He was optimistic that the success will continue to grow and bring greater changes in the agricultural sector and the lives of farmers in the country.
TFRA urges farmers who have not yet registered or verified their information to do so now so that they do not miss out opportunities with t subsidized fertilizers’ system.
