agriculture – Prime Time Communications

Out to Lunch

#OutToLunch: Farmers are willing to do the hard work, government must do the same

By Denis Jjuuko Agriculture has been for long touted as the answer to the poverty that is exhibited everywhere you turn in Uganda and in most parts of Africa. A recent study by Global Right Alert even confirmed that Uganda can get UShs10 trillion (nearly US$3 billion) annually from coffee. Our much-heralded oil revenue is estimated at about US$2 billion annually. When I read snippets of the report, I was at first tempted to ask where should we put our money? I quickly remembered that developing a country can’t be one directional. Extract the oil and get that cool US$2 billion every year and work on the coffee to get that US$3 billion too. Although many people have been focusing on coffee given the recent increment in quantity of production in central Uganda and elsewhere and the resulting high prices that have turned peasants into shilling millionaires, there is a lot that still needs to be done. The majority of farmers depend on unpredictable rainfall yet we are experiencing irregular seasons and changes to the climate. It is no longer guaranteed that it will rain during the months we all knew as rainy seasons. And sometimes when the rains come, it is very little or too much. No farmer wants to experience either. We still depend on the hand hoe to till the land to the extent that it is one of the most distributed items by candidates seeking support in the upcoming general elections. Although many farmers have small plots of land on which they grow food and cash crops, a hand hoe is 19th century stuff. Luckily, the Chinese have been kind enough to invent petrol powered ones that can help a farmer till the land faster and easily. The traditional hand hoe is a back breaking tool. One of the reasons many young people would rather sell the land, buy a boda boda, which they turn into a bed for daytime napping due to lack of passengers than spending the day in the garden. Inputs are expensive and fake. There is a need for the Uganda National Bureau of Standards to do their job to ensure only genuine fertilizers, pesticides and other inputs are on the market. It shouldn’t be very difficult to find who makes or import fake inputs. We can’t always blame everything on the impunity of some individuals with high political and military connections. If such people found a serious officer desirous of doing their job, they would back down. A certain government entity that owns a printery always refuses to print campaign posters of highly connected individuals on credit. The individuals usually curse the managers and promise to teach them a lesson but return with cash and pay. If they had found weak managers, they would abuse the system. A public officer who fails to reprimand the so-called Gamba Nogu (people with military and political connections) is just weak and wants to use the system to enrich themselves illegally in many cases. The other problem for Ugandan farmers is transportation. Some are able to grow significant amounts of produce but transport is a very big cost to bring the goods from the farmer to the market where the prices are not laughable. Agricultural produce can be rotting in a garden less than 100km to the market where there is a high demand. It was thus refreshing to read in newspapers last week that there is a project, at least for the northern region, that is working to change this narrative. With support from the Germans, the Ministry of Local Government is implementing the Rural Development and Food Security in Northern Uganda (RUDSEC) project. This newspaper reported that more than 1,300km of roads connecting farmers to markets will be rehabilitated and upgraded in Acholi, Lango and Teso regions. I regularly travel across the country and including these regions. Sometimes you find farmers with vegetables being sold at giveaway prices. One of the challenges they face is transport. The rundown Sahara or Isuzu can’t manage the roads many times. Yet we should know that an improved transport and market infrastructure would allow year-on-year accessibility. The cost of inputs would reduce because it wouldn’t take one so much to buy them. Ideally that should lead to increased inputs. Many farmers are willing to do the hard work to increase production. Entrepreneurs will set up the processing plants for value addition. The government should do its part too. Pay road contractors on time, make genuine inputs affordable, provide technical expertise and access to the market. Poverty would be history for many people. The writer is a communication and visibility consultant. djjuuko@gmail.com

June 23, 2025

News

#OutToLunch. 10 businesses one can start with capital of Shs150,000

By Denis Jjuuko There is an increasing number of Ugandans especially in Kampala starting roadside businesses since the partial lifting of the lockdown. On the roads to the suburbs where people live, there are more people selling fruits, liquid soap, and other such household items. Some look like people who have been formally employed before given their dress code and some how they speak. Some vend from fancy and expensive vehicles. With many jobs lost, this is a good thing. Over the weekend, there was a post circulating on social media (mainly Whatsapp) where somebody was inquiring what business they could do with start up capital of Shs150,000. Some people ridiculed the post as something impossible while others argued it was possible. I thought of businesses one could start with Shs150,000 and came up with 10 of them. In no particular order, here they are. Fruits vending 60 passion fruits (Masaka type) are retailed at Shs10,000. This means that one can start such a business. So with Shs150,000 one can start with more than 15 packs of 60 fruits. An apple is sold at about Shs1,000 at whole sale prices and retailed at Shs1500. So one can start selling them with 140 apples. Many other fruits can be sold with the said start up capital. Toilet paper Toilet paper vending in traffic is common these days. Retail prices range from Shs10,000 to Shs20,000 depending on the quality and location. This is another business one can start with Shs150,000. Liquid soap Making liquid soap is so easy and ingredients are readily available. One just needs to learn how to make it. A 5-litre jerrycan is sold at Shs10,000. This means that one can easily start the business with 75 litres. Shoe shinning The new normal of working from home seems not to be working. Offices are open again and Kampala is full of people. The dust in Kampala isn’t about to go away. So this is one business one can be able to start with Shs150,000 if they identified a busy location. Household supplies If you identify a few families in your neighborhood, you can start supplying them with household items. With a capital of Shs150,000 you can buy stuff from the market and you are paid on delivery. Hair plaiting Once you have the skill, you can identify a salon which you sub rent per a hour whenever you have a client. The capital is then used to purchase hair braids or weaves. Where weaves are more expensive, you simply ask a client to pay in advance or identify a shop where you can get them on credit. Fresh beans and peas vending In Kampala’s traffic, you can easily vend fresh beans, peas and vegetables all of which you can start with Shs150,000 or less. You can also identify buildings with many offices and ask for permission to deliver to clients in their vehicles as they depart after work. Bricks and sand supplies A small tipper (Elf) carries about 800 bricks. Each brick made out of ordinary soil is about Shs150. You can hire a truck and deliver them to people’s construction sites at a profit. You can also deliver sand to sites. Social media influencer I assume you already have a smartphone. You can start a business of tweeting, and making posts for organisations and individuals. Many of those standing for election don’t know a thing about social media. You can start making favourable posts for them. All you need is data and OTT. If you don’t have a phone, you can still get an affordable one. Cleaning services There is need for cleaning services in homes and business premises. You simply need soap and some pieces of cloth all of which cost less than Shs150,000. You can even employ other people to help. Where you need machines such as vacuum cleaners or high pressure pumps, you can hire them. Imagine if you negotiated with an office block and they allowed you to wash cars as office people worked, you could easily clean 10 cars a day earning Shs100,000 a day for at least five days. You can also hire brush cutters to slash compounds. There are hundreds of other business ideas one can start with Shs150,000. I just picked these ones. The writer is a Communication and Visibility Consultant. djjuuko@gmail.com

August 5, 2020

News

#OutToLunch Business bet: Grow food within 120km of Kampala

By Denis Jjuuko Last week we argued that most parts of greater Kampala will be urban in 30 years. Before that, Kampala’s population is estimated to grow to approximately 7.5 million people in the next 10 years according to the World Population Review. Urbanization means that they will be less land devoted to agriculture within Kampala’s 40km radius. Yet people still need food. Africa imports food worth approximately US$35 billion a year according to the African Development Bank and is estimated to grow to more than US$100 billion in the next 10 years. This is a result of “population growth, low and stagnating agricultural productivity, policy distortions, weak institutions and poor infrastructure,” says a report by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), a United Nations agency. Many of African dollar or even shilling billionaires are involved in food. In Uganda, we even import cabbages, onions and such other things! Yet our land is so fertile and the climate still favours agriculture. Uganda has a water body almost everywhere and even if you are to sink a borehole, the water isn’t that deep in most parts of the country. As Kampala expands and its population grows, there will be more demand for food than ever. The government is pushing industrialization as one of the ways to create the elusive jobs. With the internet and advancements in technology, many non-traditional jobs will be created leaving many youths working outside the agriculture sector. As Kampala expands, some people will become middle class. The middle class will demand more organic foods. They also don’t work in the gardens. Over the last few decades, many people have abandoned agriculture preferring to look for jobs in urban areas. The declaration that now some towns are cities will also lead to more people migrating to urban areas in search of jobs. At the end of the day, they will need food. There is a news video circulating online that the price of Matooke, the staple food in many parts of Uganda especially the populous central region has significantly gone down over the last few months. This has been largely attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the market and generally demand for food is enormous in central Uganda given the way Uganda’s economy is structured and the level of urbanization. One way farmers can cut costs and increase their incomes is by growing food that is needed in a particular market. If, for example, you grow a particular food crop where the market isn’t available it becomes expensive to transport it to the market. Let us take an example of Matooke. If you grow Matooke in western Uganda, the transport costs are enormous to bring it to Kampala where the market is. This means that the farmer will get less as the traders have to factor in the cost of transport. In the news video I referred to above, the farmers in Isingiro say the price of a bunch of Matooke is now between Shs500 and Shs3,000 instead of Shs15,000 on average they were being paid recently. In Kampala, a bunch of Matooke costs between Shs5,000 and Shs15,000 today from about Shs12,000 to Shs30,000 a few months ago. This means that most of the money the farmer could get is now taken by the transport man. With increments in taxes levied on fuel, the farmer will get much less. As you know, our value addition on Matooke is still in its infancy even though there is a factory that is being set up to make flour among other products. So the best bet for a farmer now to increase their profit is to grow food within a radius of about 120km from Kampala. This will cut down the cost of transport significantly and avoid price fluctuations that result in flooding the market. When a farmer is far away from the market, they may not be able to predict the market as they need much more time to bring the product to Kampala. A farmer within 120km of Kampala can easily monitor the market in Kampala and decide whether to bring the Matooke to the market or not since the delivery period is short. In two hours, a farmer can have his Matooke on the market if the plantation is within a radius of 120km. This calls for zoning the country so that farmers whose products are perishable like Matooke grow it near their biggest markets. Produce with a long shelf life can be grown anywhere even though the transport challenges would remain. So for those who are looking for post-COVID-19 business opportunities, growing food within a radius of 120km from Kampala is a smart bet. The writer is a communication and visibility consultant. djjuuko@gmail.com

July 9, 2020