SMALLHOLDERS DON'T HAVE SAY IN DECISION MAKING, SAYS OFFICIAL

By Fina Lyimo,The Citizen Correspondent

Moshi. Smallholders are still marginalised in the national decision-making platforms with very few policymakers making priority their pressing needs, an advocacy official has said.

One of the effects of this is failure by the farmers to commercialize their subsistence agriculture for income generation and poverty alleviation.

“Time has come for our farmers to go for higher productivity and commercialize their agriculture,” lamented Mr Thomas Laizer, an advocacy officer with the national network for small holder farmers, Mviwata.

He said during a one day seminar for the network’s members in Kilimanjaro Region that smallholder farmers in Tanzania remained poor because they are still using age old cultivation methods.

He partly attributed the problem to lack of effective representation of farmers in key decision making platforms at the national level, hence the failure to garner full support of policy makers.

“There has been no effective communication between the farmers themselves, between them and the experts and other key stakeholders as well as little exposure to potential markets for their produce,” he said.

Mtandao wa Vikundi vya Wakulima Tanzania (Mviwata), literally meaning a network of farmers’ groups in Tanzania is a farmers’ organisation which unites small-scale farmers in order to have a common voice in defence of economic, social, cultural and political interests of small-scale farmers.

Founded in 1993, the organisation aspires to empower small farmers through capacity building.

The farmers’ group also undertakes lobbying and advocacy, especially by strengthening their groups and networks, facilitating communication and education for safeguarding their interests.

CREDIT SOURCE: http://www.thecitizen.co.tz/News/Smallholders-don-t-have-say-in-decision-making--says-official/-/1840392/2571938/-/l3nnov/-/index.html