Mozambican, SA farmers partner to grow sugarcane

Eighty South African farmers in Tonga, near the Mozambican border in Mpumalanga, are being trained by fertiliser company Omnia Hectorspruit in sugarcane production.

Fifty of the farmers have already completed their training and are in Mozambique training small-scale farmers there.

"We also provide full scale training in soil analysis and help them with marketing and management," said Omnia sales representative Wally Coetzer.

Omnia has signed a 10-year contract to supply fertiliser for the project.

The project was initiated by the Mozambican farmers in 2001 when they saw the success of the small-scale sugar farming project on the South African side of the border.

At the time, Omnia was training 1,300 small-scale farmers in Tonga to grow sugar. The farmers had been given eight hectares of land each by the South African government.

The agricultural departments of South Africa and Mozambique then agreed that the Mozambican farmers receive similar support because it was of benefit to both countries.

"Each one of the farmers will be given 100 hectares of land in Mozambique to plant their sugarcane. We know this is not a lot of land, but imagine being used to planting on eight hectares and suddenly you have 100 hectares of land at your disposal," Coetzer said.

He said the project will be implemented in three phases, starting with 10,000 hectares this year, 10,000 hectares next year and 9,000 hectares when a new dam is built in the area.

The farmers will use water from the Corumana Dam to irrigate the 10,000 hectares of land that will be planted in August.

One of the farmers, Joseph Maluleka from Phiva trust outside Tonga, has been part of the project from the start and said is looking forward to the first day of harvesting.

"The project was initiated by small-scale farmers in Mozambique who saw how we were managing our eight hectares of land that we had been given by government in 1999," said Maluleka.

He said government of Mozambique agreed to provide land to the Mozambicans, while the South Africans would provide them with training and fertiliser.

"We were given a 35-year lease by the government of Mozambique and are still in negotiations with different sugar producing companies to supply them with cane after harvesting," he said.

The South Africans have a 10-year contract with South African sugar company TSB to supply it with sugarcane.

Maluleka said the South Africans had received a loan from the Land Bank and additional funds from Omnia for the project.

Article published courtesy of BuaNews