In Luweero, farmers sell 15 kgs of maize to buy a kilo of sugar

Maize farmers in Luweero district have decided to leave their dry maize to rot in the garden as opposed to harvesting it because of the horribly low prices they are being given.

Currently a kilogram of maize in Luweero is Shs250, meaning that to buy a kilo of sugar, which costs Shs 4,000, farmers have to sell at least 15 kg of maize.

Kitaka Fred, one of the few farmers in Luweero who regrets having wasted his time and money to invest in maize growing.

He said he had invested over Shs1 million to hire land, labor and buying of pesticides plus seed all together but looking at the current market price he is already counting losses.

‘"It hurts when you keep on hearing people claiming that youths don’t want to work. We have tried our level best to see that we earn from our sweat but the resulting are just weakening us,first it was army full worm now market," he said.

Kitaka is currently looking at his 5-acre maize garden, not knowing what to do next.

 The land owner wants his land since the period of hire ended but he doesn’t know what to do.

He said: “In my calculations I anticipated to haven’t five tonnes of maize and sell at either shs500 or even shs 600 and get at least Shs 2 to 3million now I am selling 100kgs at Shs 20,000."

In the past, the highest maize consumers were schools, prisons and police but now many schools and prisons have their own plantations.

The maize that used to be sold in Kenya and the World Food Programme has come under scrutiny over quality issues.