Uganda - AgricultureUganda - Agriculture
Overview
Investors consider Uganda's agricultural potential to be among the best in Africa, with low temperature variability and two rainy seasons in the southern half of the country leading to multiple crop harvests per year. According to the FAO, Uganda's fertile agricultural land has the potential to feed 200 million people. Eighty percent of Uganda’s land is arable but only 35 percent is being cultivated. Agriculture accounted for about 20 percent of GDP in fiscal year 2017/2018, and 43 percent of export earnings, and the UBOS estimates that about 70 percent of Uganda’s working population is employed in agriculture. Uganda produces a wide range of food products including: coffee, tea, sugar, livestock, edible oils, cotton, tobacco, plantains, corn, beans, cassava, sweet potatoes, millet, sorghum, and groundnuts. Commercialization of the sector is impeded by a lack of irrigation infrastructure and limited use of fertilizer, which makes production vulnerable to variable rainfall and pests. Sector growth is also challenged by the lack of quality packaging capabilities, the lack of storage facilities, high freight costs, the lack of all-weather feeder roads in rural areas, a complicated and inefficient land tenure system, and limited knowledge of modern production practices. Ugandan producers often find it difficult to meet sanitary and phytosanitary standards required to export goods to Europe and the United States. Following decades of instability, farmers in northern Uganda again have access to some of the most fertile land in the country, traditionally used to grow cotton.
Opportunities
There are signficant investment opportunities in Uganda’s agriculture sector, including in production, value addition processing, standards compliance and export, and post-harvest handling. In the coffee sector, there is space to increase coffee production and the amount of coffee exported to the United States. Uganda is Africa’s leading coffee exporter, but sends just three percent of its exports to the United States. The government has developed a detailed plan to increase coffee production and set an ambitious target of producing 20 million bags of coffee annually by 2020.
Web Resources
Partnering with USAID
Uganda Investment Authority Upcoming Agriculture Projects
Uganda Coffee Development Authority
Uganda Ministry of Agriculture
East Africa Trade & Investment Hub – Agriculture
National Agricultural Advisory Services