There is a lot of excitement ahead of the new 2022/2023 financial year because of the Parish Development Model (PDM). It has been reported that government is sinking in Shs 1.5 trillion to benefit more than 10,000 parishes countrywide.
I am one of those looking forward with hope, especially on the PDM pillars of agricultural value-chain development as well as mindset change. As a farmer who works with several youths, I am convinced PDM will be a game changer to uplift the population from subsistence into a commercial economy.
In Uganda, many youth make plans for quick cash without planning for years to come and as a result, they rely a lot on sports betting and boda boda business. When it comes to farming, they prefer seasonal crops like beans or maize.
Yet I believe there is more to earn from long-term planning in things like avocado, whose resourcefulness is unmatched. PDM can go a long way to achieve its goals if it sufficiently sensitizes Ugandans about the benefits of growing Avocado, especially the Hass type, as my experience has taught me.
My rough estimate shows every parish stands to get about Shs 100m in the forthcoming financial year and given that 80 per cent rely on farming, it is only prudent that PDM promotes a product like avocado that has been proven to have the least risks while at the same time has immense rewards financially and health wise.
From a statistical point of view, Hass avocado’s global market value is $15 billion, according to recent figures from Transparency Market Research (TMR) and is set to reach $21bn by 2026. Kenya, which has wholly embraced Hass avocado growing, earned Shs 153 billion from exports last year alone.
What’s more, Hass avocado is quite easy to cultivate because it needs less care and unlike previous mass farming interventions like vanilla, moringa or silk worm, Hass avocado guarantees no loss because what you cannot sell can be consumed.
Of course, the challenge is getting the right seedlings because there are many fake Hass avocado seedlings on the market and many farmers have fallen prey to this. I was once a victim of this before I started buying them from Kenya. However, this is a bit out of touch with many farmers because a good seedling costs about Shs 10,000. Nonetheless, it is guaranteed to give you at least 100 kilograms at every harvest. A kilo of Hass avocado goes for about Shs 20,000 on the European market.
On that background, PDM has the capacity to bridge the gap of fake seedlings and high cost of buying genuine seedlings.
So, my simple suggestion would be for PDM to start from the grassroots by preparing a mindset change in young people by helping them appreciate and embrace farming, in this case Hass avocado.
It should be inculcated into the young people that farming is a source of progress and wealth, not backwardness as many of them think. For instance, if PDM invested in supplying all learners from say Senior One with four seedlings of Hass avocado for planting, it would not only help them appreciate the allure of farming but in just two years, they would start harvesting and selling the avocado.
This implies that within just four years, that learner would have 36 Hass avocado trees. This means the learner would be able to pay for their school fees as well as that of the siblings and would therefore not be dependent on government for help as the nagging saying ‘Tusaba Gavumenti Etuyambe’ goes.
When it comes to a community, they would have capacity to create an association to sell the produce. Maintaining the gardens would be cheap and there would be no sabotage since everyone would be benefitting. With time, the community can even acquire resources for a machine that extracts oil from avocado. In six years, this cycle would be productive and more rewarding than boda boda business where it is one man for himself.
