Sharp increase in crop prices threatens food security, agency warns

The Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET), a USAID-funded activity, has warned that access to food by poor households in Tanzania's rural and urban areas is becoming increasingly difficult because of high crop prices, particularly that of maize, the country's staple. "FEWS NET recommends that government urgently release the remaining tonnage of its plan from the Strategic Grain Reserve to protect the poor from falling into hardship and recourse to extreme (self-damaging) coping mechanism, such as selling productive assets," the agency said in its monthly food security report issued on Thursday. It urged the donor community to respond to an appeal in August by the government by pledging and delivering food aid. "If the donor contributions are delayed further, the affected poor farmers will leave home in search of jobs or income generating opportunities to the detriment of tending their fields," FEWS NET said. Most household in villages normally depend on their own food crop production, the agency said, but this year, due to poor production, farmers have also depended on food supplies from markets. It said it recently visited several villages in the districts of Magu, Misungwi and Kwimba in Mwanza region and established that retail maize prices were double those of 2002. "Poor households are not able to compensate for this maize price increase with income from currently higher yellow gram and cotton prices because these households focus their investments and efforts on food crop production, which performed poorly in the past season, rather than cash crops," FEWS NET reported. It said that in several urban markets, food crop prices had continued to increase, causing access problems for those who depended on the market. For example, it said, compared with prices in September 2002, average wholesale maize prices this year were higher by 10 percent in Sumbawanga (southern highlands), 60 percent to 75 percent in Dodoma (central) and Arusha (north), and 100 percent to 140 percent in Dar es Salaam (east coast) and Mwanza (Lake Victoria basin). [The FEWS NET report is available online at: www.fews.net]