How war loss compensation is benefiting Masaka Cooperative Union farmers

MASAKA – Following a lengthy dispute by the cooperative movement in the country for compensation over the years, the government heeded the pressure and started off a process to recompense the cooperative unions that lost their property during the years of political instabilities in the country.

Among the unions that fell victim to the political instabilities was Masaka Cooperative Union, which lost several tonnes of coffee stock, over 110 trucks, buildings, machinery, documents, human resources, and even land.

The first installment of the reparations amounting to at least Shs 6.7 billion out of a total of Shs 17.8 billion was received in 2020. This marked the beginning of the journey to restore the lost glory of Masaka Cooperative Union, which was mainly in marketing the coffee supplied by its primary societies.

After receiving the partial payment, the union started to revamp its administration and reclaim its key assets, although some have not been recovered as anticipated by the Union’s administrators.

Against all odds, Masaka Cooperative Union has become the gateway to ending poverty in the region, as per the government’s aim of transforming and lifting communities from subsistence to the money economy.

The general manager of Masaka Cooperative Union, Emmanuel Ssenyonga, confirms that the revival of the union has become a viable vehicle for self-transformation for small-scale farmers whose coffee production and processing capacity have increased.

”The collapse of our union made our member farmers suffer hard-biting poverty, but currently we are empowering them. We used part of the compensation funds from the government to construct stores where they now collectively bulk their coffee produce and bargain for a fair price,” Ssenyonga says.

At least six coffee stores have been constructed in different sub-counties in the Masaka region. Currently, the union boasts of establishing strong community social cohesion where more than 100 primary cooperatives holding at least 1,000 registered small-scale farmers in rural communities have been revived.

This has also had a positive impact on small-scale farmers’ crop production, an improved value chain, quality control, and access to cheap agricultural finance, among other benefits.

”We are doing this through sensitisation of farmers on how to properly manage their cooperative societies and ably use their collective voice to bargain for fair coffee prices and raise their household incomes,” Ssenyonga says while talking to theCooperator.

He adds that the Union has invested in the activities of the farmers, such as training them, providing them with market information, and helping them embrace proper agronomic practices while rewarding them for better performance.

“We buy coffee at good prices from the farmers but also reward individual farmers who have maintained the good quality of the coffee delivered. The Union has saved farmers from unscrupulous middlemen who cheat them by offering low prices,” he says.

Using compensation money, the Union has also provided employment to several youths and women in the region, both directly and indirectly, by providing agricultural extension services and educating cooperators on post- harvesting, produce quality control, soil fertility sampling, and testing.

The union has employed its own agricultural extension workers to monitor farmers’ gardens, provide them with knowledge, and also monitor the quality of the coffee.

It has also bought one Tata lorry truck to collect the farmers’ coffee stocks from all the different sub counties after bulking at the different stores.

In partnership with Buganda Kingdom, Masaka Union has also embraced the Mengo- based Emwanyi Terimba campaign and holds farmer sensitisation sessions where knowledge on best practices for coffee business is shared.

Further, the partnership includes distribution of coffee seedlings to the farmers, monitoring, and training, which has increased production.

The union acquired a fleet of motorcycles to ease transport for the several extension workers in the region to reach out and support the coffee farmers spread across the greater Masaka region.

Masaka Cooperative Union sales and marketing manager, Richard Muganzi says in 2019, the union started a sister company called Masaka Union Cooperative Financial Services Ltd. (MUCOFI) for farmers to save money and also enable them to access agricultural loans at a low interest rate.

“We thought it would be wise for us to have a financing facility for the farmers to access cheap agricultural loan facilities since it was identified as a huge hindrance to their production,” Muganzi says.

Using compensation money, Masaka Cooperative Union also provided a farm shop at its headquarters in Masaka City, where farmers could access quality agricultural inputs. This is complimented by a Shs 4b coffee grading unit installed with modern grading machinery at Kyabakuza.

This has enabled the Union to address issues of quality coffee beans, with a capacity to produce at least 500 tonnes of clean, dry coffee beans referred to as fair average quality (FAQ).

To diversify its incomes, the union has also established other projects, including a model forest with at least 12,000 drought-resistant hybrid eucalyptus trees at Kitoma parish and at least two nursery beds of disease-resistant coffee seedlings of KR1 up to KR7 located in Kyabakuza word in Masaka city and at Kagologolo in Bukomansimbi district.

The board chairman of the Union, Joseph Kavuma, says the transparent transaction of business by the union staff has won them trust from farmers who supply tonnes of coffee to the union’s grading coffee factory.

With increasing coffee production, the Union has formulated a strategic plan to guide it in turning its grading unit at Kyabakuza into an export hub for processed coffee at least by 2025.

Evidently, the Masaka region produces two million bags of Robusta coffee every year, with districts of supply including Masaka, Kalungu, Bukomansimbi, Lwengo, Rakai, Kyotera, Mutukula, Lwengo, Sembabule, Kalangala, and Lyantonde.

Other cooperative unions that have been fully or partially compensated for suffering losses during the political instabilities include Banyankole Kweterana Cooperative Union, West Acholi Cooperative Union, West Mengo Cooperative Union, Uganda Cooperative Transport Union, Lango Cooperative Union, Teso Cooperative Union, and North Bukedi Cooperative Union, although some have started limping due to internal managerial conflicts over property and funds. Bugisu Cooperative Union, got compensation following their successful winning of court case.

The History

Masaka Cooperative Union was arguably one of the strongest forces to reckon with in the cooperative sector in Buganda through the 1960’s, 70s, and 80’s before it was affected by political instabilities.

With multiple primary societies across the greater Masaka region, stretching from present-day Lyantonde and Sembabule to Rakai and Kalungu, the union was the dominant player in the socio-political economy of the region, producing coffee, maize, milk, matooke, and other products to sustain the regional influence in Buganda.

Among the oldest unions, Masaka Cooperative Union was running at least 34 processing plants in the region, held several demonstration farms, and had farmers’ training facilities recognised in the East African region.

The Union also had ranches in Rakai, Masaka, Lyantonde, Kalungu, and Lwengo during the heydays, while exporting coffee to the regional market.

Like other cooperatives in the country, after the 1986 liberation war, Masaka Cooperative Union was heavily indebted after losing much of its property to the guerrillas between 1980 and 1986. This included coffee stocks, about 100 Tata trucks, farm tractors, ginneries, and other farm production equipment.

During the government’s ranch restructuring programme, the Union lost most of its ranches; properties were sold, and land was also auctioned to recover some of the debts owed by the primary cooperatives.

The final blow was occasioned in 1999 by the closure of the Cooperative Bank, in which the Union had banked its fortune.

“The closure of Cooperative Bank dashed away all our hopes to get our money and do business again; all the union money was in the bank, and they did not tell us what happened to our money,” recalls Leonardo Bukenya, a Cooperator and farmer in Kalungu.

Formed in 1951 to bring together coffee farmers into units to market their produce with stronger bargaining power against the dominant Indian and white-led coffee monopolies at the time, the union immediately became a regional powerhouse, stretching its influence into northern Tanzania.

With the increasing trade in the product, the Union started receiving attractive prices for coffee, increasing its stock and threatening Asian dominance as well as winning more trust amongst fellow African farmers.

In 1958, Masaka Cooperative Union received a contingent of coffee farmers from the Ankole region to provide support and training to enable them to start the Banyankole Kweterana Cooperative Union.

The latter then grew its influence in the Ankole region, amassing wealth and membership in the districts of Mbarara, Rwampara, Sheema, Ntungamo, Kiruhura, Isingiro, Mitoma, Bushenyi, Rubirizi, and Buhweju.

The two have since maintained their business relationship amidst the challenges of different economic times.

https://thecooperator.news/pdm-saccos-in-greater-masaka-receive-over-shs-22bln/

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