Jump to navigation

Tanzania

Arusha comes to the rescue

Tanzania’s NFRA plans to export 1 million tonnes of corn to neighbours facing shortages following droughts

Tanzania’s National Food Reserve Agency has agreed to sell 650,000 tonnes of corn to Zambia over the next eight months as Lusaka counts the costs of the drought caused by El Niño (AC Vol 65 No 12, Debt and drought weigh down economy).

Tanzania’s Agriculture Minister Hussein Bashe told reporters late last week that Arusha plans to export 1 million tonnes of corn this year to neighbours facing shortages following the droughts after out producing its own national demand of around 6m tonnes by 2.1m tonnes over the past year.

A request for maize and corn imports has also been made to Uganda.

The drought has led to a major drop in water levels at Zambia’s hydroelectric power plants in response to which President Hakainde Hichilema’s government plans to import electricity from Tanzania.

Hichilema has requested US$900m in drought-related financing from the international community, of which it says it has now received around $500m. However, the droughts were a major contributor to ministers cutting economic growth forecasts for 2024 from 4.8% to 2.3% in May.

Zambia’s state-owned electricity utility Zesco has said that it needs to import power to avert an energy deficit that could affect its copper production. The Hichilema government is also hoping to revive abandoned private sector-led power projects and speed up work on an interconnector with Tanzania.



Related Articles

Debt and drought weigh down economy

Finance Minister Musokotwane cuts growth forecasts as worst dry spell in four decades and a weaker kwacha drive up the cost of living

Making significant progress towards restructuring its debts, three-and-a-half years after defaulting on its Eurobonds, Africa’s second-largest copper producer is struggling to contain the fallout from severe droughts, continued...


Copper slide

Three months after his tiny election win, President Banda finds his country running out of money and jobs

The slide in the world price of Zambia's main export, copper, from US$8,000 to $4,000 a tonne over the past year casts a shadow over economic and political...


Too close to call

The gap between the leading presidential contenders is narrowing fast in this landmark election

It looks like Zambia's closest election ever, as eleven runners sprint, hobble and lurch towards the finish of the first-past-the-post contest on 27 December. The real prize is...


False-flag operation

Two Zambian-flagged merchant ships suspected of shipping weapons to Libya have been stopped in the Mediterranean by European Union naval vessels enforcing the United Nations arms embargo, according...


Trophy-hunters after Kikwete

The President comes in for a storm of criticism over elephant and rhino poaching but the true picture is more complicated

Embattled President Jakaya Kikwete has tried to fight back after coming under intense fire from the British Mail on Sunday newspaper and politicians at home and abroad over...