A smallholder farmer in Magwi County of Eastern Equatoria State has appealed to the government to facilitate a transition to modern methods of farming so local farmers can maximize profits.
Margret Oliver, a farmer and business woman who makes her living through the products that she produces from her farm says she uses local hand tools for her farming activities.
Margaret specializes in growing cereals such soya beans, sorghum, millet, root nodules, simsim, pigeon peace, groundnuts, and green gram.
While saying she enjoys her work, Margret also laments that the use local farm tools was exhausting and decreases production.
Margret was speaking to City Review during a three-day National Conference Agriculture and Food Security that aimed to strengthen and exchange network between national government, state government, NGOs, farmers’ associations, and development partners in Agriculture.
She said her wish after the conference was for her be given a tractor so that it could make her work easier and faster when digging
“Tractors were brought, unfortunately they didn’t reach the famers on the ground. These tractors ended in wrong hands, some of them were given to NGOs, they ended up in the hands of the big people, they did not reach us [farmers],” she said.
“Let the tractors not be given to the NGOs to go and distribute, the other thing is that we don’t have capital to go and buy seeds so we need support as farmers in the country,” she added.
She said farmers from Magwi just like farmers from other parts of the country face challenges like the issue of poor roads that they would use for transporting farm produces.
“Let the government make the roads, bring for us tractors, if we have all these things done then there will be no hunger in the country because we have fertile land and if all those things are there then we don’t have a problem,” she said.
“We the farmers, would like the Government to end the suffering of farmers because the current situation in the country is affecting us so much especially us the women who are windows,” she bemoaned.
Margret does not only plant cereals, she also collects lulu seeds from the bush and that the lulu seeds helps her in feeding her children because she could make them eat the fruits and after words she collects the seeds and dries them up.
She explained that after the seeds dry up they are fried and grinded then mixed with water and rinsed to give cooking oil.
In most African countries, agricultural is very central to sustainable livelihood. In South Sudan President Salva Kiir donated 1000 tractors to the states to implement his pledges of improving and boosting food security in the country, however, many of the tractors were allegedly personalized by state governors and government officials.
According to Margret, the government needs to prioritize road infrastructure because she believes that the agriculture sector can save the country from reliance on food aid.
During the conference, that was marked under the theme “Let’s Produce What We Eat,” the Vice President for Economic Cluster James Wani Igga stated that there was need for allocation of 10% percent of the national budget to the agriculture sector, the most underfunded sector in decade.
“The Ministerial Economic Cluster will increase our national budget of the Ministry of Agriculture Food and Security in the upcoming financial year,” he said.
According to the Vice President, agriculture is important to in developing the country because it contributes in employment opportunities.
“It is an important source of livelihood where workers and marginal farmers are engaged in non-agriculture jobs like handicrafts, furniture’s, textiles leather metalwork and also in processing industries and other services,” he said.