Farmers reap big from potato vines

Mr Tito Wanaale of Ndolwa Village in Buyende District, a renowned sugarcane grower, is buoyant after increasing his household income from potato vines .

With the inclusion of the semi-evergreen climbing plant on the list of his farming initiatives, the returns have forced him to raise the price from Shs6,000 per sack to Shs20,000.

“I bought this land at Shs2m and a bull, and first grew rice, but only got Shs300,000. I then turned to sugarcane growing which fetched me Shs650,000 after 18 months.

“But after cutting down two acres of sugarcane and replacing it with potato vines, I harvested Shs3.6m in the first season and Shs2.7m in the second season,” Mr Wanaale said at the weekend.

According to Mr Wanaale, sugarcane and rice growing have not only left farmers frustrated with some burning down their canes due to lack of market and low prices, but also left them without food.

This, he adds, has prompted them to discover quick-maturing, ready market and multi-purpose sweet potatoes for nutrition, food security and also income.

“With exposure from Centre for International Potato, I adopted irrigation during the dry season, dug three water source ponds and I am now set to reap over Shs10m due to high demand for vines and at least Shs8m from the potatoes later. I have invested Shs2m,” he said.

Skilling farmers
Mr Wanaale and six other demonstration farmers from Buyende and Kamuli districts were identified and trained in good agronomic practices and promoting sweet potato seed business by Centre for International Potato.

Mr Srinivasulu Rajendran, the centre’s agricultural economist, said sweet potatos are a major food crop for wealth and health in Eastern and Southern African countries.

However, he noted that smallholder farmers have not been able to achieve its potential yield due to lack of access to quality seed and reliance on farmer-to-farmer exchange of vines of unknown quality, which he said is a key constraint to increasing productivity.

“Our focus is to make sweet potato growing a business that brings farmers’ lucrative net profits. We are working in collaboration with the national sweet potato programmes to strengthen the technical, institutional and financial capacities for sweet potato production and improve farming system and livelihood,” he said.

Dr Margret McEwan, the head of Sweet Gains Project in Uganda and Tanzania, described the local initiative and enthusiasm by the farmers as “humbling”.

The National Agricultural Research Organisation (NARO) roots, tubers and bananas team leader, Mr Christopher Omong, hailed the Centre for International Potato for complimenting NARO’s efforts in uplifting production and productivity of sweet potatoes.

Mr Omong urged local farmers to take advantage of the Parish Development Model fund to ditch rain-based farming for appropriate irrigation technology farming, including water-harvesting and value addition so as to have food throughout the year.