Ramakrishna Karuturi, India`s biggest investor in Africa and leader of a delegation of Indian investors in agricultural and allied sectors currently on a tour of Tanzania, makes presentation at India-Tanzania (IPP Media)
Tanzania: Indian business leaders now eye Dar Es Salaam agricultural sector
Finnigan Wa Simbeye
KILIMO Kwanza has received a big boost as Indian agro-business leaders join their government to seek local partners with land to invest millions of dollars in agricultural production of mainly food items.
A delegation of 35 top agro-business leaders from the Asian nation under Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ICCI) was hosted by Tanzania Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Agriculture (TCCIA), Agriculture Council of Tanzania (ACT) and Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC) last week talking partnerships to revolutionize the country's struggling agricultural sector.
"If we get the right partners and the potential is there, we are ready to invest up to one billion US dollars (about 1.6trn/-) in Tanzania's agricultural sector," said Hari Vallurupalli, Joint Managing Director of NSL Sugars Limited.
Mr Vallurupalli whose company deals in production of sugarcane, palm oil, rice, cotton and mining, has identified some potential in the country including presence of natural gas which may be used as a raw material for fertilizer manufacturing.
"There is very big infrastructure potential in this country for my company and hopefully we will find local partners to work with," said Vallurupalli.
Nirmal Seeds President, Ashish Wele said his company is interested in commercial hybrid seeds germination which is what the country needs to realize an agrarian revolution.
Mr Wele said Nirmal Seeds wants not more than 30,000 hectares of land to invest in seeds production to feed the local market.
"We see Tanzania as a hub in the region to enable our company supply the vast eastern and southern Africa market," Mr Wele said.
The company has rice seed production project in Mozambique and vegetable project in Ethiopia.
Currently the country produces only 13,828 tonnes of hybrid seeds per annum against potential demand of 120,000 tonnes, according to Minister for Agriculture, Food Security and Cooperatives, Professor Jumanne Maghembe.
The Indian agro-investor said modern hybrid seeds are an important ingredient to back up a green revolution as experience has indicated saying the Asian nation which has a population of over 1.2 billion feeds itself and exports surplus because of modern seeds.
Monnet Group India's President Vijay Somani said his company has already registered a local subsidiary which is seeking to generate power from coal and exploit iron ore in the south to produce sponge iron and steel.
"In a few days our team of geologists will come to survey the project site in southern Tanzania before we can commit to the investment," said Mr Somani.
Monnet Group India which is the country's second largest coal based sponge iron manufacturer in the Asian nation, is also interested in thermal power production and manganese ore mining.
ACT Chairman who is also TIC board member, Salum Shamte assured the Indian delegation to find Tanzania a better place to put their money in the agriculture sector because the government is committed to the agrarian revolution as defined by Kilimo Kwanza agro-blueprint.
"Tanzania is an agricultural sleeping giant which we hope with your investment may help revolutionize the sector," Mr Shamte noted.
He said over 90 per cent of the country's agricultural sector is dominated by smallholder farmers and urged the visiting Indian agro-business delegation to be ready to safeguard such people's interests.
Mr Shamte touted the need for the private sector to work with the public sector in addressing challenges in the sector as the country has already adopted a Public Private Partnership law to safeguard such arrangements.
Indian High Commissioner Kocheril Bhagirath pledged his government's commitment to boost bilateral ties between the two countries saying a new 92 million US dollars (about 138bn/-) loan to support the agriculture sector will be released by New Delhi to Dar es Salaam soon.
Mr Bhagirath said Indian Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, promised to work closely with Africa during an India-Africa forum held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia last May which identified 21 joint projects for cooperation.
"For us Tanzania is a very important country in the region especially in the agriculture sector which is why we are supporting it," Ambassador Bhagirath noted.
India which rivals China as the most populous and fastest growing emerging economy needs more food production and energy to sustain its over 1.2 billion population.
The Chinese government and its private sector are also undertaking a lot of projects relating to energy and food production in the country including a 1.2 billion US dollars 400MW coal to electricity project in partnership with National Development Corporation at Mchuchuma and Liganga iron ore and coal mines.
