Prona Agri-Business Matters

He quit his job to make Honey wine, The story of an Enterprise development Specialist By: Prossy Nandudu Pix: Prossy Nandudu Ambrose Bugaari, an Enterprise development Specialist, has been working with farmers under different projects in Uganda for close to 13 years.  Throughout his work, he observed that most farmers didn’t have the capacity to add value to their products especially those from bees like honey.      It was in 2002 that he realized that there   few products from bees on the market, apart from honey ,honey combs, and candles, many   people knew nothing more about bees.  Having worked with farmers under different organizations, Bugaari therefore decided to start up his own business. “I saw that there was limited range of bee products on the market yet one can do a lot more from bees through its honey, as the main ingredient. Having observed that there were very few honey products on the market, he decided to come up with a whole new pro

Rural Farmers to get Hybrid Indian chicken to boost house hold incomes By Prossy Nandudu Farmers in rural areas are to benefit from the newly launched Kuroiler project to improve house hold income and the quality of their life.   The project is being implemented by the National Animal Genetic Resource Center and Data bank (NAGRC&DB) in collaboration with Arizona State University with financial support from the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation.   Under the project, farmers will be able to get kuroiler birds through their district production officers from the NAGRC&DB) at a minimal fee.   The Kuroiler is a new breed of chicken from India that was launched in Uganda after assessing its performance and discovering its potential through trials in 2011, according to the executive director NAGRC&DB Dr.Daniel Semambo.     “We estimate that each family with Kuroiler chickens will produce twice the amount of meat and four times the number of eggs co

Parliament asked to allow Central Bank to amend the law on Islamic banking   By Prossy Nandudu     Financial experts have called on Parliament to allow Bank of Uganda and the ministry of Finance make amendments on the Islamic banking Law for the growth of the financial sector in Uganda.   If parliament continues to keep the law in Parliament , Uganda is bound to loose investors from Islamic countries to neighbours such as Kenya , Rwanda and Tanzania .   The call was made by Grace Ndyareeba, a financial consultant with GN Associates and former risk manager at Bank of Uganda, in an interview at his office in Kamwokya.     “If parliament continues to cling on the law, they will be raring the growth of the financial sector which is critical for the growth of the financial sector in a country,” said Ndyareeba.   He also added that what is left are simple amendments that can be done by the central bank and then laid on table at Parliament by the fina

Why farmers have failed to access agricultural loans in Uganda   By Prossy Nandudu.   In the last financial year, government has earmarked another 30 billion shillings as a revolving fund for farmers to borrow and increase production. This was an addition to the 60 billion revolving fund released earlier on.   However some financial institutions and analysts are not happy with the way the money is being handled.   Much as government is setting aside this money through commercial banks, farmers have failed to access the funds.   In an interview with the Abdul Kyanika Nsibambi the manager, Agricultural Lending Centenary Rural Development Bank says that farmers have failed to access the finances because they come with many conditions.   For example, they may talk about a loan amount that will need some one borrowing 50 million or they are only lending to production or commercial farmers.   He said that in Uganda there are no many big commer