<p></p><p>Mtwara. Tanzania’s erstwhile promising cashew nut industry is in jeopardy due to what is seen as privatisation that has gone awry, The Citizen has been informed.The $145 million (about Sh232 billion at current exchange rate) sector is in limbo because of privatisation that was effected without proper plans to ensure sustainability, says a report by the Mtwara Cashewnut Board of Tanzania (CBT).The CBT is now calling on the government to take a bold move that would entail repossessing the privatised factories if it is to save the cashew nut industry.TCB acting director-general Ayubu Mbawa is pointing says that privatised factories have miserably failed to do deliver.He told the Parliamentary Public Organisations Accounts Committee (POAC) recently that the factories have been turned into warehouses and consequently, the country is losing billions of shillings for lack of market for Tanzania’s processed cashew nuts.</p> <p>Other stakeholders also told the committee the warehouse receipt system has failed to be effective due to lack of enthusiasm on the part of the businessmen as well as failure by the relevant government authorities to make timely interventions.As a result, produce worth billions has been rotting in warehouses with no clue as to where the cooperatives will get money to pay the farmers their second and, if possible, third instalments.This is because traders who were expected to purchase the cashew nuts have declined to buy for reasons that, TCB says, are not convincing.Sources told The Citizen that many businessmen were against the warehouse receipt system because it has been introduced as a way of 'empowering' cooperatives while marginalising small and medium businesses involved in cashew nut buying. </p><p> Mr Mbawa said in one of the meetings with the POAC that most of cashew processing factories stopped operating two years after being privatised, noting that of 12 factories that were operating prior to privatisation, only two continue to function.The factories were established in the 1980s after the government borrowed some $184 million from the World Bank, but some of the factories have been sold for as low as between $30 to 75 million.However, even those two surviving factories are operating below their capacity, for while each was constructed to process 10,000 tons nuts per year, they currently process a mere 2,000 tons.The report says the reasons for the under performance were lack of electricity, water and low capital.As a result, Tanzanian is forced to sale most of cashew nuts unprocessed in overseas markets. This season, the country harvested over 155,000 tons of cashew nuts, while local factories were ready for only 4,000 tons. </p><p>The traders’ virtual strike against has rendered blow a fatal blow to the industry as more than half of the harvest for this season were still in warehouses.Of the 155,000 ton yield, the highest ever since independence some 85,000 tons are lying in warehouses with no hope of finding a market since dealers are not willing to export.Farmers who have sold the crop were also stranded as there is no assurance they will be paid their second instalments.Mr Mbawa said the privatisation of the cashew processing factories have failed to meet the intended goals, therefore, contributed to the underdevelopment of the crop and farmers.“We had expected that after privatisation the factories could improve the sector, but that hasn’t happened,” he said.He said under the prevailing circumstances, it is hard for the country to dispose of its cashew nut produce as there is only one major market, that is, India.To make mattes worse for this country, India has also become a cashew farming country, which has reduced the latter’s demand for Tanzania’s unprocessed nuts. </p><p>“We, however, always receive orders for ready-to-eat nuts, but we can’t deliver since we don’t have the necessary capacity to process them,” said he said.For his part, the Chairman of the POAC, Mr Zitto Kabwe, wondered why the country was comfortable with exporting raw cashew nuts, which also means exporting employment.He noted that apart from the job losses, exporting raw nuts also denies the country 1,600 litres of oil that is produced in the course of processing ready-to eat ton of nuts. </p><p>The failure to sell the nuts have also meant loss to farmers who would only be fully paid after that export of the produce that they delivered to the cooperative unions through the new system of warehouse receipt.Whereas some of them were not paid at all, others still demanding remained 30 per cent of their payment since under this system the farmer is paid in two instalments - 70 per cent when he sells the crop and the remaining 30 per cent after the crop has been sold abroad.Since most farmers were expecting to spend the money from the second instalment for spraying their cashews for the next harvest, those who spoke to The Citizen said they were now stranded.One of them, one Mr Issa Nangwalanya, complained that the death of cashew nut processing industries is spelling economic doom for him and his fellow farmers.Mr Murtaza Mangungu, a member of the POAC, asked the board to seek other external cashew nuts markets besides India through Tanzanian embassies. </p><p> </p><br><p></p>