The Buganda Kingdom Coffee Project, known as Mwanyi Terimba, has received Ugx413 million from President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni towards poverty alleviation in the Kingdom.
According to State House comptroller Jane Barekye, while presenting the check on behalf of the President on June 14, 2024, at an agricultural exhibition ceremony held in Bulemeenzi County Luwero District, the gesture is a mark of the government’s wealth creation efforts in the country and Buganda Kingdom.
President Museveni, in his speech read by Barekye, commended the Katikiro of Buganda, Charles Peter Mayiga, for working hard to fight poverty in Buganda through coffee growing.
“I’m happy that the Buganda cultural institution has come out to partially support the NRM wealth creation formula that we put forward in 1995 and the NRM manifesto of 1996. We had actually started earlier in the 1960s as a student movement with our efforts to persuade the cattle keepers of the cattle corridor to abandon nomadism and also leave subsistence farming to engage in commercial agriculture with calculation (Ekibalo),” H.E. Museveni said.
The President welcomed Buganda’s interest in coffee but urged them to grow other food crops for self sufficiency and to embrace the NRM 4 acre model.
“However, you need to know that coffee is only a beverage. Although it has other industrial uses, it is not a food like milk or fish. People will also always need food. Therefore, involving our village small-scale operations in the food lines is the safest insurance for their prosperity. I therefore strongly advise you to align your message with ours of the 4 acres and seven activities as mentioned above,” the President emphasised.
The president also noted that although Luwero District has been affected by war, there has been some transformation in the cattle corridor south of the Nile.
“Some continued mistakes notwithstanding, the cattle-keeping parts of Buganda have benefited from this transformation. These are Lyantonde, Rakai, Sembabule, Gomba, Kiboga, Kyankwanzi, Goma, and Buruuli. It was when these efforts were beginning to show success that I embarked on a countrywide tour to replicate the success in the cattle corridor,” President Museveni noted.
“In order to decide on what activity was high value or not, they looked at one acre and how much is earned on that acre per year. That’s when he identified the 7 activities of coffee, fruits (mangoes, oranges, pineapples, grapes, and apples), pasture for zero grazing of Friesian cows, food for family (Millet, Cassava, Banana, Irish, Potato), poultry and piggery in the backyard, and fish farming on the edges of the wetlands, not in the centre,” he added.
He further called for extensive agriculture for those people with ample land, saying that they need to not only export but also provide Ugandans with enough food like beef, cotton, maize, milk, and sugarcane, among others, producing these in large amounts.
The Buganda prime minister welcomed the financial support from the president and promised continued cooperation.
