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Lubega Christopher

Dr. Owino Abraham

Bachelor of statistics

October 31st, 2016

Agriculture in Uganda

Introduction

Agriculture is the major driver of Uganda’s economy. It contributes the largest

percentage to the country’s gross domestic product and employs the highest percentage of the

country’s total labor force. It is the source of livelihood for people especially in rural areas in

terms of household revenue and food. There are two types of agriculture practiced namely; crop

growing and animal husbandry and are discussed below;

Crop growing

In Uganda many types of crops are grown and can be divided into annual crops and

perennial crops. Annual crops are grown for periods not longer than one year and on harvest, the

entire plant is destroyed. These include cereals like maize, rice, sorghum, millet among others.

Maize is the most common cereal in Uganda and is grown in almost every district of Uganda.

According to the Uganda census of agriculture conducted in the 2008/2009 agricultural season,

the leading district in producing maize was Iganga followed by Soroti both found in the eastern

region of the country.

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Other annual crops grown in Uganda include legumes like beans, soya beans, ground nuts

and peas among others. Beans are the most grown legume followed by ground nuts and are

grown in almost all districts in the country. The central region is the leading producer of beans.

Tuber crops like cassava, Irish potatoes, sweet potatoes and yams are also grown in large

quantities and are mostly used for food and the surplus is taken to the market. These tend to stay

in the soil for periods longer than one year due to partial harvesting and their classification is

often challenging especially during collection of data regarding their growth (Lubega and

Owino, 46).

Plantation crops are also grown in Uganda and they include bananas and sugar canes.

These occupy the soil where they are grown for long periods of time greater than one year but

they are classified under annual crops because the entire crop is destroyed during harvesting.

Perennial crops grown in Uganda include mainly tree crops like coffee and fruits like

mangoes, oranges, jack fruits etc. Coffee is the most dominant perennial crop and it is grown in

many districts across the country. It is mainly grown for sale and it is the leading source of

income from agriculture in all the crops grown in the country. There are two types of coffee

grown in Uganda and these are Robusta coffee and Arabica coffee with the former being the

dominant. Most of Uganda’s coffee is exported and it contributes a significant percentage of total

export earnings of the country (Foyn and Kaspersen, 16).

Crops in Uganda are grown under different schemes and methods for example mixed

cropping where two or more crops are grown simultaneously on the same piece of land and crop

rotation where the land is divided into different plots and a different crop is grown on each plot

every season in a rotating manner for purposes of maintaining the soil fertility.
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Crop growing in Uganda is mainly dependent on natural weather changes with only a few

farmers practicing modern methods like irrigation and as such there is a regular pattern in the

seasons of planting corresponding to the natural seasons of rainfall and sunshine.

Animal husbandry

Many activities in Uganda take place under this form of agriculture and they include

animal rearing, bee keeping, poultry and aquaculture. Animals reared in Uganda include cattle,

predominantly reared in the western and northern regions, goats, sheep, pigs and rabbits among

others. Animals are kept to produce a number of products which include milk, meat, skins which

are later processed into various products for the market (Wang and Su, 150).

Under poultry, different kinds of birds are kept and they include chicken, ducks, and

turkeys among others and are kept mainly for eggs and meat. Under fisheries, fish is caught from

most of the water bodies and wetlands across the country while some farmers carry out fish

farming on their farms. Many species of fish caught in Uganda but the most common ones

include tilapia, nile perch and silver fish.

Challenges faced by agriculture in Uganda

The agricultural sector of Uganda is faced by a multitude of problems and these include the

following

Dependency on natural climatic conditions. In Uganda farmers heavily rely on climate to

carry out agriculture without any other alternatives. This has resulted into very poor yields
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whenever the climatic conditions change unfavorably for example during periods of long

droughts.

Predominance of subsistence agriculture. Agriculture in Uganda is predominantly of

subsistence nature where people carry out agriculture mainly for food and only sell the surplus.

This is caused by limited resources like land and capital available to farmers.

Pests and diseases. Uganda’s agriculture is constantly faced by poor yields resulting from out

breaks of new and already existing pests and diseases to some of which the solutions are

unaffordable to farmers especially in rural areas.

Constantly depreciating soil fertility. The population of Uganda grows rapidly but the land

available for farming does not increase. This leads to increased use of the available land which

becomes rapidly exhausted.

Poor breeds of crops grown and animals reared which do not give good yields and are not

resistant to unfavorable weather conditions and to pests and diseases.

Poor land tenure system. The land system in Uganda is characterized by breaking land into

small fragments and uncertainly of ownership which affects the size of farms and choice of

activity people choose to carry out on the land for example people who do not own land cannot

grow perennial crops.

The government of Uganda is however doing much to mitigate the effect of these challenges

by investing a lot of resources in agricultural advisory services and agricultural research. To that

effect, it has established two bodies that is the National agriculture advisory services (NAADS)

and the national agriculture research organization (NARO) under the ministry of agriculture,

animal industry and fisheries. Their main objectives are to increase commercialization of
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agriculture, distribute good breeds of animals and seeds and to carry out agricultural research

among others.

Conclusion

Agriculture is the most important sector in Uganda. It is carried out in all districts of the

country but mostly in rural areas. It includes a wide range of activities classified mainly under

crop growing and animal husbandry. Crop growing is further classified into growth of annual

and perennial crops. Animal husbandry on the other hand is divided into animal rearing, poultry,

bee keeping and aquaculture. The sector is faced by a number of challenges but the government

has put in places measures to solve most of them.

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Works cited

Foyn, T.H.Y &L.L. Kaspersen. Uganda Strategy Support Program (USSP) Working Paper
No. 06 Price transmission for agricultural commodities in Uganda, 2010

Lubega.C & Owino. A.Y. Analysis of determinants of coffee farm gate prices in Uganda,
International journal of sciences: applied and basic research. Vol. 32, No.342, 2016

Yi Wang &Xin Su. Fractal Analysis of the Agricultural Products Prices Time Series,
International Journal of u- and e- Service, Science and Technology Vol.8, No. 1, 2015
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