High fertilizer demand may affect price and consumption in Burundi

According to the Africa Fertilizers a joint initiative organization led by International Fertilizer Development Center (IFDC), fertilizer demand in Burundi is expected to hike causing inflation of the fertilizer price.

“There is low fertilizer demand in the country. Planting of the “2022A” season crops was concluded in October and harvesting has begun. For other farmers, they have started land preparation for season B which starts in late February,” statement reads from the IFDC.

The high global fertilizer prices resulted in increased local prices is one challenge the farmers are facing in the season according to the IFDC.

“No shortage of fertilizers has been reported so far. Projection of demand/ local prices for next month Fertilizer demand is expected to increase in February ahead of “2022B” planting which accounts for about 50 percent of the annual crop output” statement reads.

“The high fertilizers prices may negatively impact the demand and consumption this season,” warned the IFDC.

This comes week after the Burundi minister of Internal Affairs Gervais Ndirakobuca gave the country’s leading fertilizer producer company FOMI (Organo-Mineral Fertilizers) ten days to produce enough fertilizers countrywide.

According to FOMI representatives the scarcity of the fertilizers was due to the high demand of consumers/farmers since this year the demand stood at 37,000tons of fertilizers compared to 27,000tons in 2021.

Burundi depends mainly on agriculture with the sector generating more than 80 percent of the country’s foreign exchange.

In 2016 East African Legislative Assembly passed a resolution for East Africa member states to fast-track the Malabo declaration by putting in place financial instruments which are responsive to the needs of small scale farmers.

Despite agriculture contributing to more than 30% of the region’s GDP, there have been a significant decline in the budget allocation by East African member states in agriculture sector. African Union’s Malabo declaration aims to end hunger and reduce the poverty rate in the continent by a half in the year 2025.

Agriculture employs about 80 percent of the region’s 172 million people who live in rural areas and depend on agriculture for their livelihood, Rwanda won the best overall Malabo Biennial Review Gold Award in Africa scoring the highest marks.

However no country was on track in the overall for enhancing investment finance in agriculture, however only Burundi was on track in East Africa in government agriculture expenditure as of the percentage of total government expenditure which should be at least 10 percent.

In Uganda agriculture contributes up to 24 percent of the country’s GDP with 80 percent of Uganda’s exports are agriculture products which includes coffee (22%), tea, cotton and fish.