Take advantage of improved farming practices

Mainly due to population pressure there is plenty of land fragmentation going on in Uganda. People struggle to earn cash to support their families and they must also work hard to produce enough food by just farming on the small plots they occupy.

The trend now is to practice mixed farming which means keeping livestock like, pigs, dairy cattle and poultry in order to get such products as milk, eggs, and meat for sale and for food.

They also grow crops such as bananas, coffee, ground nuts, beans, potatoes, cassava, and maize for both cash and food. Somehow mixed farming acts such as an insurance policy because if the crops fail the farmer can earn some money from the sale of milk, eggs and meat.

Another advantage of mixed farming is that livestock droppings can be used as manure to boost crop production on the farm. Besides, some crop residues such as maize stalks, millet straw, fresh bean husks, and banana peelings can be fed to animals. Until we learn to keep the rate of our population growth under control the need for increased food production will continue to exert pressure on our food production capacity.

The only way out seems to be learning to maximise production on the small plots of land that we work on. This means increased use of improved farming practices such as going for improved seeds, usage of fertilisers, herbicides, and pesticides. The practice of saving seed from the past harvest is outdated because it is not really reliable if the farmer is keen on high yields.

Which serious farmer nowadays does not have a budget for buying seed? If you want to grow coffee you must go to a good coffee nursery and purchase cloned seedlings. This is the same for tissue culture banana seedlings. They are clean and free from disease.

Go for grafted mangoes, avocados, and oranges. Visit a farmers shop to get hybrid maize and recommended bean varieties seeds. Many seed varieties have been bred to be disease and drought- tolerant by our own scientists in National Agricultural Research Organisation (Naro).

This is the planting material that serious farmers go for. And they must pay because as farmers they are not expected to get free things. They are in business! Befriend and visit successful farmers in your area to copy how they do their thing.

Michael J Ssali is a veteran journalist.