POWERING ON

Government Meeting

Marko, Mathew and myself meeting with the Director of the Hanang District Council. We had worked hard to arrange a meeting with the Minister for Agriculture on the 4th of June. Marko's brother-in-law is now the Parliamentary Secretary and arranged the meetings for us. Our Ag scientist friend, Bill Crabtree had booked a ticket from Perth to coincide with this date as his time was very limited. On Sunday I heard back that the meeting had been moved to the Monday 3rd, (panic!). It turned out Bill couldn't get a flight on Tuesday and had to come Monday! We had very fruitful meeting with the Minister for Agriculture, (no photos) and he arranged for us to meet with his senior staff, the following day. Because of the work we are doing helping the local farmers, the Government is keen to be of assistance to our project. The minister and his staff are interested to find some land for us to use as a demonstration and training farm that would become a base for the expansion of our project. They are quite open in admitting that farming in Tanzania is not really dong well at all. They are looking for people who can help them especially in dry land agriculture.

Bill flew out to Ghana where he is working with another project.

Jones, Marko and I drove back to Katesh to meet with the local government leaders.

Mathew Darema is a good friend of ours and is now the chairman of the government party in Hanang District, (Katesh, where our project is.) He is so supportive and straight away took us to meet the new Council Chairman.

So many things that were obstacles are no longer there any more and these local leaders are really desperate for help with improving farming in their region.

We have been working in this area for 5 years now and these local government leaders are keen to help us expand our project to assist as many farmers as possible. At their suggestion we have applied for an old government farm in Hanang, but even if this land doesn’t work out, it is so important for us to keep good relationships with the government people.