In an interview with AIM, JICA’s Assistant Director for Southern Africa, Sakaguchi Kota, explained that “this year we are going to start a new project of technical assistance to ProSavana costing 12 million US dollars. This amount is in addition to the 13 million dollars already set aside for ProSavana, making a total of 25 million dollars”.
Sakaguchi Kota explained that ProSavana is a long term project for the transformation of subsistence and commercial agriculture in the Nacala Corridor in the north of Mozambique. He stressed that future activities are still under discussion, with help for Mozambique taking the form of technical assistance, loans and non-refundable donations.
Kota was speaking on the margins of an international conference on investing in Mozambique which had over two hundred participants.
The key speaker at the conference was Mozambique’s Agriculture Minister, Jose Pacheco, who is in Japan with a high level delegation which includes the governors of the three provinces covered by ProSavana, namely Niassa, Nampula and Zambezia.
Also in the Mozambican delegation are the coordinator of ProSavana, Calisto Bias, representatives of the Niassa Farmers Union and Kabir Ibrahimo from the Confederation of Mozambican Business Associations (CTA).
Former Minister of Agriculture Helder Muteia also attended the event in his capacity as representative of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) in Portugal and the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CPLP).
In his speech to the conference, Jose Pacheco reiterated that Mozambique offers comparative advantages in agricultural production. He stressed that agriculture is the pillar of the country’s development strategy.
In terms of potential for development, Pacheco referred to the fact that the country has 36 million hectares of arable land of which only ten per cent is used.
Pacheco added that about 3.3 million hectares of land can be irrigated of which only 14 per cent is developed.
He said that developing this potential has been a major challenge to the government, which is why in May 2011 it approved the Agricultural Sector Strategic Development Plan (PEDSA) which incorporates ProSavana.
Post published in: Africa News