Nsibambi hails Kibirige

By Francis Kagolo and Moses Mulondo

UGANDA, The New Vision - Kampala, Oct. 14, 2008

The cassava improved the capacity of Ugandans to increase their food security,” Nsibambi, who spoke on behalf of the Government, pointed out. ...


Prime Minister Apolo Nsibambi has commended former agriculture minister Kibirige Ssebunya for his exceptional research and development initiatives. Kibirige succumbed to cancer last Wednesday at Mulago Hospital. Speaking during a funeral service at the packed Namirembe Cathedral yesterday, Nsibambi said Kibirige would be remembered for discovering clonal coffee, introducing palm oil cultivation on Ssese Islands, and having led the research team that produced mosaic-resistant cassava varieties.

“The clonal coffee he initiated is a high-yielding variety which has earned Ugandans foreign exchange and homestead incomes. The cassava improved the capacity of Ugandans to increase their food security,” Nsibambi, who spoke on behalf of the Government, pointed out.

He hailed Ssebunya for demystifying the perception that highly educated people cannot make good political leaders. “Although he was a staunch NRM supporter, Kibirige did not discriminate against people of other political parties. Indeed, in being gregarious, he shared local brew with ordinary people.”

The Prime Minister called the deceased a humble and accessible man. “He rejected constructing a fence and a gate at his residence in order to enable members of his constituency access him readily. He also rejected being guarded by Police men, arguing that he did not wish to be protected against the people who loved him dearly.”

The Kabaka (king) of Buganda, Ronald Mutebi, hailed Kibirige for having demonstrated that a Muganda politician can serve the central Government and remain committed to his kingdom. “Kibirige has been our great friend. He has been very helpful to us, especially on matters concerning the kingdom’s agricultural programmes,” the Kabaka said in a speech read by Edward Lutaya Mukomazi, the kingdom’s agriculture minister.

George Ssenabulya, the retired bishop of West Buganda, who led the service, hailed Kibirige for having been a man of wisdom and encouragement.

NRM secretary general Amama Mbabazi described Kibirige as hardworking and exemplary in NRM. “He did not entertain nonsense, even in the party.”

Other dignitaries at the service included deputy chief justice Laetitia Kikonyogo, agriculture minister Hilary Onek, gender minister Syda Bumba, state ministers and MPs.

Pro-Poor Biofuel Crops: Sweet Sorghum and Cassava

Written by Nick Chambers

USA. Gas2.0 - Portland,OR, Oct. 13, 2008
Posted in Food vs. fuel, International issues

Editor’s Note: I was in Houston, TX, last week, celebrating the International Year of the Planet at the first ever joint meeting between the American societies of Soil Science, Geology, Crop Science and Agronomy. With a significant focus on biofuels, this conference was rife with interesting materials.

The Challenge: Find biofuel crops that are “pro-poor.”

One Answer: Crops that can be grown with limited resources by small-scale farmers, can be converted to biofuel with existing cheap technology, and can simultaneously provide food, fuel, and livestock feed.

In my last post I discussed how agriculture could regain its rightful place as the keystone of civilization due to the rise of biofuels over the next 30 years or so. But, in what seems a ridiculously colossal conundrum, hundreds of millions of impoverished people worldwide could face starvation due to competition of fuel land with food land.

In that post, I began to address how to deal with this problem, but didn’t provide any concrete examples — the main reason being that nobody really knows how to solve it yet. Imagine my luck last week when I found myself amidst scientists at a forum on biofuels, food security and poverty who had plenty of good ideas on how to reconcile these two seemingly contradictory issues.

One of the most interesting solutions that cropped up (pun intended — so shoot me) involved what are being dubbed as “pro-poor” biofuel crops. Dr. Mark Winslow covered the pro-poor aspects of sweet sorghum and to Dr. Hernán Ceballos covered the same aspects of the cassava plant.

Sweet sorghum is an Africa-native plant that produces grain which can be harvested for human consumption. After grain harvest, the stalks can be squeezed for sugar, much like sugarcane, which can then be turned into ethanol. Even after ethanol production, the remaining stalk material can then be pressed and used as a high-quality livestock feed.

Cassava is a tropical plant that produces bulbous starchy roots. These roots can be eaten by humans and can also be converted to ethanol in much the same way that corn is. The leaves of the cassava plant are called “tropical alfalfa” and are used as livestock feed. The left over stem material is then cut into foot-long pieces and planted in the ground to propagate the plants.

In both cases, these crops are already grown by many impoverished cultures around the world as a source of food and livestock feed, so the agricultural knowledge needed to grow them already exists.

Both crops are grown on land that doesn’t compete with high value food crops such as wheat and rice. And, besides this, neither sweet sorghum or cassava would provide a large enough economic incentive due to biofuel production that major food crop growers would switch over to just growing these instead of staple food crops like wheat and rice.

Without a doubt, pro-poor biofuel crops have several kinks that need to be worked out before they can be widely adopted in developing countries:

Yields of the fuel-producing parts of the plants need to be increased before they can be economically viable, but through intensive breeding this hurdle is being quickly jumped.

The infrastructure for transportation of biofuel feedstocks from many hundreds of scattered farms to a central processing facility is no small feat to build. For this to be accomplished, countries need to be convinced that it’s a worthwhile goal enough to pour money into. It may be better to produce only enough fuel for local consumption.

Many pro-poor biofuel crops are grown in areas that are susceptible to drought. A worldwide source of crop insurance needs to be established so that these farmers are protected in the case of low rainfall. The crops themselves also need to be bred for drought tolerance.

Even with the hurdles, these types of pro-poor biofuel crops represent a promising way for poor farmers to become an integral part of the world energy supply, bring high value back to agricultural products in their respectively impoverished nations, keep food prices low, and provide food from local sources.

Other Posts From the Joint Meeting in Houston:
How Much Oil is Actually Left On This Planet? Should We Care?
Biofuels are Here To Stay: What To Do About Food Supply?
Image Credits: Pictures from talks by Dr. Mark Winslow and Dr. Hernán Ceballos.

Tags: alternative energy, alternative fuel, Biofuels, Cassava, Crop yields, Dr. Hernán Ceballos, Dr. Mark Winslow, Ethanol, Famine, Food Supply, Global Economy, Houston, Poor, Poverty, Pro-poor biofuel crops, Sweet Sorghum, texas

Africa: World Bank Awards $4 Million to Agricultural Projects

Bernard Busuulwa

THE EAST AFRICAN All Africa.com; Nairobi Oct.14, 2008

The World Bank has awarded $4m to innovative agricultural projects across the globe, including three based in Uganda, Tanzania and Nigeria. The Bank, under its Development Marketplace Programme, a competitive grant scheme aimed at financing innovation in development activities, awarded the money to 22 innovative projects from 16 countries, with the majority originating from Latin America and the Caribbean.

The latter has eight projects each, followed by East Asia and the Pacific region with six, sub-Saharan Africa with five and South Asia with three winning projects.

Cambodia, Ecuador, Mexico, India, Vietnam and Brazil have two winning projects each. The winners received up to $200,000.

The 2008 awards were co-sponsored by the World Bank, the International Finance Corporation, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Global Environmental Facility and GTZ, the German development agency.

The World Bank is also keen on uplifting the status of rural agricultural producers through the awards initiative.

"The World Bank is delighted to sponsor the Development Marketplace as a launching pad for new ideas in development. With the global community focused on the food price crisis, it is an opportunity to showcase the kind of creative thinking that can deliver tangible benefits to producers struggling with poverty in rural areas," said Katherine Sierra, vice president of sustainable development at the World Bank.

Among the winning projects are milk coolers supported by beer cooling technology for use by Ugandan farmers with facilitation from the University of Georgia.

The technology is focused on alleviating problems faced by smallholder diary farmers. Incomes are expected to increase through boosting supply of high quality milk to the market.

It is also expected to boost Uganda's ongoing Prosperity for All programme that is designed on a mixed-income strategy that comprises crop and livestock production activities with strong emphasis on dairy farming. The programme will benefit over 5.5 million Ugandans, according to the government.

The innovation is also seen as a welcome boost for Uganda's underexploited dairy sector, which is still plagued with problems of disease, poor budget allocations and low export income.

"We are investing in export of dairy products but we need to boost quality. Disease is still a problem. Most of our products are consumed locally. The project will help to boost capacity to meet both local and external demand, which will increase foreign exchange earnings. However, we need to protect our borders effectively against unregulated movements of cattle, because they tend to spread diseases," said John Odit, a member of Uganda's Parliamentary Committee on Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries.

Production of biofuel from indigenous non-edible nuts by Africa Biofuel and Emission Reduction Ltd, based in Tanzania, was also honoured in this year's Development Marketplace awards. The project is engaged in cultivation and sale of an indigenous non edible oil seed for production of biofuel.

The seed, which is harvested from the croton tree, has helped provide a new and sustainable cashcrop for smallholder farmers in Tanzania, thereby boosting poverty alleviation and energy production efforts.

Utilisation of cassava waste for raising goats, an innovation undertaken by the University of Abeokuta in Nigeria, was similarly recognised.

The project's objective is creation of a new market linking cassava producers and goat keepers through introduction of a simple drying technology capable of turning cassava waste into goat feed.

Through the project, farmers' incomes are expected to rise while reducing carbon dioxide emissions by eliminating the need for burning cassava waste.

A Senegalese project for providing affordable and environmentally friendly transport for agricultural products to the market was also awarded.

The project employs traditional boats run by locally produced biofuel consuming outboard motors that rely on processed indigenous oil seeds for fuel supplies.

It is targeted at farmers and fishermen from 40 communities who are expected to benefit from reduced costs of transport to the market through generating their own biofuel using an alternative power transmission method that absorbs unrefined seed oil straight from the cold press, hence reducing operational costs.

Award winners have in the past used the grants as seed money for improving their operations or replicating their work elsewhere, according to the World Bank.

Call them to account

says Paul

BARBADOS. Nation Newspaper. Barbados Leading Newspaper; Oct.13, 2008.

BARBADOS NEEDS stronger policies to deal with people who buy stolen produce. James Paul chief executive officer of the Barbados Agricultural Society (BAS), in making the point said farmers were losing their crops on an ongoing basis and, as a nation, Barbados had to clamp down on this activity. "We have a way of ignoring certain things according to who is involved in them. What is happening is that the people involved in praedial larceny are being ignored by the authorities," he said during a BAS Agrofest livestock presentation seminar on Saturday at Blue Horizon Hotel, Rockley, Christ Church. "It seems that in our society, when you do wrong, you are right. There is a network in Barbados where people arrange to steal produce and we need to condemn this in strong terms," he said.

He said that if praedial larceny continued unchecked it would result in less private sector investment and in agriculture operating below par, which would hurt Barbados.

"It's not a case where agriculture is not profitable; the level of wages for agricultural workers is better then some other occupations, but still we have the problem of people stealing rather than working," he said.

Paul also referred to farmer Patrick Bethell's battle with crop thieves as "a tragedy".

Bethell recently destroyed the remainder of his one-acre cassava field, worth between $30 000 and $40 000, after thieves took more than 100 plants in an 11-day period.

"I think it is a tragic event, especially since we are trying to get farmers to grow cassava.

"I understand why Bethell destroyed his crop although I was hoping to convince him to follow a different route, but he was making a point," he said.

The cost of feed has been a major worldwide bone of contention as corn, a major ingredient, is being used in ethanol production. Barbados has recently asked farmers to grow cassava, which could be used as a substitute in feed. (CA)

No sense in destroying crop

Mr Bethell

BARBADOS. Nation Newspaper.com; Barbados Leading Newspaper; Oct. 13, 2008.

I am addressing this letter to farmer Patrick Bethell who chose to destroy his cassava crop after some of it was reported stolen. When the enemy angers you he controls you. Mr Bethell I sympathise, empathise, but I do not side with you. You made your complaints on TV, the radio and in the print media. We all agree you planted acres of cassava and the thief or thieves should be in jail. What satisfaction has your ploughing your labour into the ground for a few stolen holes of cassava gained you?

I am totally against any kind of theft, but your actions were selfish and did not give even the police a chance to act on your behalf. It is my strong belief that the commissioner who heard your complaints was putting things in place.

Please answer me this question Mr Bethell: if a thief had broken into your home and stolen some valuables not once, not twice but thrice, would you burn down your house?

Why should you bring a curse on the blessings God has given you?

– MICHAEL SEALY.

Valdehuesa: Why Would the City Council Endanger Our Watershed

By Manuel Valdehuesa
Street Talk

PHILIPPINES. Sun.Star, Oct. 13, 2006.

Objective: to build within an 18-hectare compound a chemical processing complex with cassava as raw material. But let's be clear about one thing: let's NOT quarrel with bio-ethanol production per se. It's a pioneering, even visionary, project - for it will certainly help the economy. Blended with petroleum, bio-ethanol is an alternative fuel for vehicles. It will help reduce the country's oil dependency. Nor should we quarrel with planting cassava or establishing plantations for it. It will ensure continuing supply of the tuber while boosting livelihood for farmers. Agriculture poses no harm to the environment...Compared with PhilAgro's, the Alsons plant will be a hundred times larger -- producing not starch but ethanol (ethyl alcohol) -- 100,000 liters of it every day. The project document states that to attain this volume, 36 hectares of cassava will be harvested daily and hauled by 100 trucks operating round-the-clock across Misamis Oriental and Bukidnon. This will already complicate our already chaotic highway and city traffic. Presumably, the ethanol produced will be delivered in tankers to the docks for shipping, posing another set of risks.


ALREADY much abused, neglected and degraded, the city's environment faces a new hazard in -- of all places! -- the heart of its watershed system. It is threatened by what may appear to be a harmless ordinance but which is fraught with dire consequences. And it was enacted by the City Council during its first session of the year -- while no one was watching!

Ordinance 10885-2008 reclassified lands straddling the upland barangays of Bayanga and Mambuaya from agricultural to agri-industrial. The Council passed it to enable Alsons Consolidated Resources Inc. -- the giant industrial firm famed for its cement-making operations in Iligan -- to construct a toxic, polluting bio-ethanol processing plant on top of Cagayan River right beside the whitewater rafting route which boosts the city's economy and gives it star-billing in Asia's tourism world.

What's your take on the Mindanao crisis? Discuss views with other readers

If this misguided ordinance is not repealed, it will invite more industrial activity in that fragile part of the watershed and raise the specter of contamination to the subsoil and underground water table that sustains the city's ecosystem -- leading to the demise of Cagayan River itself, then good bye to whitewater rafting and ecotourism.

This is reckless endangerment, to say the least. That zone has a porous sub surface laced with streams feeding into Cagayan and Iponan Rivers, plus a network of caves surrounded by vegetation where some endangered flora and fauna still thrive. It is the zone beside the city's only significant stretch of forest -- which sustains the aquifer beneath and the rivers and their tributaries.

Just weeks ago, the Kagay-an Watershed Alliance (Kawal), an environmental conservation group, learned of the ordinance's enactment last January 7 - to the dismay of its members. Kawal reports that it was passed (1) without consultations or public hearings; (2) without benefit of expert opinion on the proposed project; (3) without bothering to peruse its feasibility study; and (4) without checking with the city planning, environment, or health offices.

Minutes of that session reveal that the ordinance was enacted on the basis of a letter addressed to the Vice Mayor, who referred it to the committee on agriculture and environment for action, which then sponsored it, and the plenary passed it without the regulation second or third reading. The Vice Mayor didn't even bother presiding.

Prompted by the ordinance, Alsons purchased an initial 24 hectares from landowners in the two barangays at an undisclosed amount. And only then did it arrange for a meeting to present the project to the locals -- not before as required for an ECC (environmental compliance certificate) by the DENR.

It is not clear whether Alsons has already obtained the ECC, but there is activity in the zone now - indicating that it is starting to mobilize. Objective: to build within an 18-hectare compound a chemical processing complex with cassava as raw material.

But let's be clear about one thing: let's NOT quarrel with bio-ethanol production per se. It's a pioneering, even visionary, project - for it will certainly help the economy. Blended with petroleum, bio-ethanol is an alternative fuel for vehicles. It will help reduce the country's oil dependency. Nor should we quarrel with planting cassava or establishing plantations for it. It will ensure continuing supply of the tuber while boosting livelihood for farmers. Agriculture poses no harm to the environment.

But we must quarrel - and quarrel BIG! - with locating the raw cassava's processing plant at that particular location. Locating it there and not elsewhere is irresponsible. It's like allowing a septic tank to be constructed beside someone's artesian well. An industrial processing plant belongs in an industrial zone -- like Phividec in Tagoloan-Villanueva - not in the heart of a watershed system amidst an agricultural-cum-eco-tourism zone.

Experts testify that cassava contains hydro-cyanic acid -- a highly toxic chemical (cyanide!) with lethal effects if handled improperly. Even at home, one had better know the safe way to handle or cook cassava, or it will become poison. Awful reports of poisoning due to careless preparation have taught us this devastating lesson.

Cyanide is lethal -- think of assassins in spy movies using it for instant effect! It is volatile - meaning, its particulates become airborne and blow away in all directions, polluting and stinking up the environment. For an idea of its minor effect, think of the simple operation of the PhilAgro-Industrial Corporation in nearby Baungon which produces a few hundred bags of cassava starch by grinding -- no fermentation, no distillation, no chemical processing. One can smell its putrid odor down on the white-water rapids and up as far as the airport. Rafting operators and customers have been complaining about this.

Compared with PhilAgro's, the Alsons plant will be a hundred times larger -- producing not starch but ethanol (ethyl alcohol) -- 100,000 liters of it every day. The project document states that to attain this volume, 36 hectares of cassava will be harvested daily and hauled by 100 trucks operating round-the-clock across Misamis Oriental and Bukidnon. This will already complicate our already chaotic highway and city traffic. Presumably, the ethanol produced will be delivered in tankers to the docks for shipping, posing another set of risks.

Any accident or spill will pour effluents on the soil, poisoning it and the underground water table. Carelessness or error in the plant -- fermenting, distilling, storing or transporting it, will be devastating. There's no such thing as an acceptable risk when it comes to toxic environmental damage. And no one can guarantee that none will happen.

But no one bothered to ask or call for comments on the project. Had the councilors bothered, they would have learned that (a) the processing plant will draw tons of clean water from Monigue Spring, the area's main source of potable water -- depleting it; (b) the used/dirty water will then be disgorged lower down the same spring, emptying into Cagayan River, and endanger the downstream, downtown barangays.

Meantime, it is uncertain what the two barangays and the city will derive in added value or earn in social or economic terms -- the plant requires less than 200 workers only, mostly technical. But Alsons will earn billions. And it's a good bet that in case of accident or destruction to the environment, the people will have to shoulder the cost of mitigation, rehabilitation or rescue.

This episode shows how cavalier the City Council can be towards environment and public health hazards (consider our sewers or the lack of it!), how subservient it is to its AWOL presiding officer, how casually it manipulates legislative procedures, and how contemptuously it views the public to the point of betraying its trust. Why would they do this and for how much?

Ask incumbent councilors Caesar Ian Acenas or Alden Bacal, ex-councilor Constantino Cabacungan, aspiring Councilor James Judith, and, yes, their truant presiding officer!

A former UN executive and director at the development academy of the Philippines, Manny heads the Gising Barangay Movement and writes Mondays, Wednesday, Fridays. valdeman_esq@yahoo.com