TARI UKIRIGURU AND TANZANIA COTTON BOARD LEAD THE NATIONAL TECHNICAL COMMITTEE MEETING OF COTTON VICTORIA PROJECT.
- 15th July, 2024 05:43
- By DAUSON.MALELA
- News
![TARI UKIRIGURU AND TANZANIA COTTON BOARD LEAD THE NATIONAL TECHNICAL COMMITTEE MEETING OF COTTON VICTORIA PROJECT.](http://tari.go.tz/./assets/uploads/photo/02bced5fcea83d40de2c5c16469c5067.jpg)
The National Technical
Committee has been held on 12 July, 2024 in Shinyanga region by bringing
together cotton stakeholders from eleven Tanzanian regions in which Cotton
Victoria Project is in implementation. The regions involve Mwanza, Simiyu,
Geita, Mara, Shinyanga, Tabora, Katavi, Kigoma, Singida, Dodoma and Morogoro.
Among the attendees included
the Acting Director General of the Tanzania Cotton Board (TCB), Mr. James
Shimbe, project coordinators and researchers from the Tanzania Agricultural
Research Institute (TARI) Ukiriguru centre, project supervisors from the
participating regions and other government officials in charge of agriculture coordination.
The key intent of the meeting
was to evaluate the project’s development in the last farming season
(2023/2024) and to set strategies of uplifting its performance in the next
season of 2024/2025.
In his presentation Dr. Paul
Saidia who doubles as coordinator of the project from TARI also Ukiriguru
centre director said in the 11 regions of project’s implementation, 217,061
farmers out of 517,343 equivalents to 42% adopted the new planting spacing of
60cm x 30cm.
“We have moved from 40
percent to 42%, This is achievement and thanks to all kind of efforts that
project participants were undertaking” He said calling for more joint efforts
that will enable to reach about 600,000 farmers in the next seasons.
In the next faming season of
2024/2025, stakeholders have pledged to put more muscles in many areas
including increasing pre basic seed production to reach a target of 20 tones
cotton, updating dose rate of insecticide according to new spacing in different
soil types, updating social economic information according to new spacing in
different soil types and also to ensure more media coverage, farmer’s field
days, and demo plots to disseminate new technologies to new cotton growing
areas.
On his part Acting Director
General of the TCB Mr. James Shimbe said the Cotton Victoria project has
positively impacted the industry as farmers have been eye-witnessing how other
fellow farmers harvest to 2,000kg per acre through 60cm x 30cm spacing. He also
commended TARI researchers for innovating the planting machine ‘Rafiki Plater’
that simplifies planting activities in a recommended spacing.
In Tanzania, the Cotton
Victoria Project was established in 2016 under the partnership of Brazilian and
Tanzanian government with the aim to
solve the challenges facing Cotton Sub-Sectors in the country. It
also includes other stakeholders from inside and outside the country such as
the Tanzania Agricultural Research Institute (TARI), Brazilian Cooperation
Agency (ABC) the Brazilian Cotton Institute (IBA), the Federal University of
Lavras (UFLA), Tanzanian Cotton Board (TCB) Local Government Authorities just
to mention a few.