By ISAAC OTWII

Government is set to commission two more fruit processing factories in Nwoya and Yumbe districts in June, an official has said.Mr Daniel Mabirizi, the planning, monitoring and evaluation officer at National Agriculture Advisory Services (Naads) secretariat, said the government is commissioning the factories to increase processing facilities in the country.We have been supporting production over a period of time. Consequently, this has led to the need to support farmers at the upper end of the value chain, he said on Tuesday.

Mr Mabirizi said the facilities set for commissioning are Yumbe Mango Fruit Processing Factory, with a capacity of five metric tonnes per hour and Kayunga Fruit Processing Plant. Kayunga factory has a capacity of 600kgs per hour.

In 2017, government encouraged farmers in Nwoya District to grow citrus fruits, mangoes and cassava with a pledge that there would be ready market after the completion of a Shs8.5 billion mango processing factory.

Naads and Uganda Development Corporation (UDC) then signed a memorandum of understanding with mango farmers in Yumbe District under their umbrella association Aringa Fruit Farmers Cooperative Society Ltd (AFFCSL). This was to establish a five-metric tonne per-hour fruit processing factory in the area under a public sector initiative. The project is being undertaken by FoNuS, a company owned by Makerere University lecturers from the School of Food Technology, Nutrition and Bioengineering.

Mr Mabirizi said the installation of the equipment is ongoing at the two facilities pending commissioning in June. Mr Patrick Alip, the agricultural officer in charge of Operation Wealth Creation in Lira District, said fruit farmers in Lira are demotivated after they were turned down by authorities at Soroti Fruit Factory.

Lira fruit producers association went to Soroti Fruit Factory to look for market for their fruits and they were told the variety they had was of low quality, he said.Soroti Fruit Factory was launched in April 2019 to tap into the abundant citrus fruits for commercial production of oranges and mangoes. However, the joy of farmers, who had anticipated to reap from the sale of their produce, has since died out due to lack of market for the fruits. Between November 2019 and January, more farmers a cross Teso watched in disbelief their fruits got rotten.

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Government to open 2 fruit processing factories - Daily Monitor