<p></p><p>CASHEW NUT Board of Tanzania (CBT) has embarked on bulk procurement of cashew farms inputs, which include fertiliser and pesticides, in a move designed to cut costs as the new season for the crop starts later this month.The CBT Acting Director General, Mr Ayub Mbawa, told 'Daily News' on Tuesday that eight firms have been contracted to supply 182,000 litres of insecticides and 5,230 tons of fertilisers.Mr Mbawa named the firms as Export Trading company (5,000 tons of sulphur 99 per cent dust) and Suba Agro-Trading and Engineering company who will supply 230 tons of Sulphur 80 per cent WP fertiliser.</p> <p>"We have already picked suppliers and they have started to bring in the consignments," Mr Mbawa said in a telephone interview from Mtwara.He said the board had conducted sensitisation meetings with farmers and co-operatives on the new modalities of procurement.Mr Mbawa named other suppliers of insecticides as Mukpar (Tanzania) Limited (45,000 litres of Hexaconazole 5SC), and Equatorial Africa Limited (25,000 litres of Lambda Cyhalothrin 5EC).Also in the list are Hangzhou Agrochemicals (Tanzania) Limited (27,000 litres of Chloropyrifos +cypermethrin EC), Kizota Agro-Products Limited (30,000 litres of Profenofos 720EC) and Equatorial Africa Limited (5,000 litres of Chlorothalonil 500SC). </p><p>As the new season starts with preparation of farms there are 85,000 tons of cashew nut worth over 100bn/- stranded in warehouses for lack of buyers. On the stranded cashew nut the DG said they are exploring the new markets for raw cashew nut, which is currently dominated by India by 90 per cent.He named new markets as Vietnam, China and some Middle East countries.Mr Mbawa noted that another approach would be to promote local processing of the crop. Tanzania produced 157,000 tons during the 2011/12 season, the highest harvest ever and it is likely that more will be produced if farmers get paid their dues amounting to 65bn/- early. The acting Mtwara Regional Co-operative Advisor, Mr John Henjewele, said on Tuesday that anytime from now farmers' claims would be settled, but he was not sure of the date."Banks (NMB and CRDB) are still doing verifications of claims, but I have the feeling payments will be ready soon," Mr Henjewele said.<br></p><p></p>