The Brazilian Agency for cooperation has promised this March 19th 2018 to improve the cotton sector in Burundi as it is going through a critical period due to land scarcity, climate change and parasites attack in East African region. The Brazilian Agency for Cooperation includes the Burundi cotton sector in its “Cotton Victoria Project” which also concerns Kenya, Tanzania and Brazil.
Déo Guide Rurema: “Burundi like other countries in the East African region faces problems in the cotton sector”
“Burundi like other countries in the East African region faces problems in the cotton sector. Brazil which is among the top five countries that cultivate and import cotton all over the world wants to revitalize the cotton sector in East Africa in general and Burundi in particular,” says Déo Guide Rurema, Minister of Agriculture.
He also says the cotton production has considerably decreased though cotton is among the three main export crops in Burundi. “Coffee, tea and cotton were the main products that previously provided a lot of currency to the country; unfortunately, cotton generates less nowadays,” he says.
Pierre Claver Nahimana, Director General of Burundi Cotton Processing Company- COGERCO, says the cotton sector is going bankrupt. “Over an area of nine thousand hectares of cultivable area where cotton was cultivated in the 1960s, an area of only three thousand hectares remains today,” he says adding that people opted for food cultivation because of the population growth.
Nahimana says Burundi like other countries from the East African region will learn a lot from Brazil and implement new agricultural techniques to upgrade this sector thanks to this Brazilian Agency for Cooperation. “The target is high production. It is true that there are problems but with the coaching of Brazil through the cooperation, Burundi will be able to increase its production”.
“From a production of 1000 tons to that of 1500 tons of fiber cotton today, Burundi aims at 5000 tons in few years,” he says.
The second meeting of the Victoria Cotton Project steering committee is going on from this 19 to 23 March 2018 in Bujumbura. The first meeting took place from 17 to 21 July 2017 in Nairobi.
IWACU Open Data
