KARUSI, April 23rd (ABP) – With the aim of preaching by example, the secretary general of the CNDD-FDD party, Réverien Ndikuriyo, who grew maize on eight hectares (8ha) in Karusi province, harvested it on Thursday 18 April 2024.
The harvest, estimated at around 15 tons, was not the best, according to BPEAE director Jean Séverin Sinzobatohana, because the land was open. He explained that under normal conditions, on sufficiently smoked soil, it is easy to harvest 6 tons per hectare.
However, SG Ndikuriyo was satisfied with the harvest, and hoped to have more in the following seasons, and asked for more free space to cultivate. He told the governor, Mrs Dévote Nizigiyimana, that he has many children to look after, i.e., whom he feeds and clothes.
He has made a request for 60 ha or more, if possible. He also wants to build his own storage shed, as that is currently causing problems with the quantities of maize purchased by the government.
According to the provincial governor, Karusi, the province has already paid more than three billion francs for maize grain, and is in the process of paying seven billion, meaning that the local population has already sold a quantity costing more than ten billion francs. Other quantities, belonging mainly to progressive farmers, are still either in the fields or in their stocks, waiting for the sale to reopen.
The SG of the ruling party asked the Karusi provincial administration, if there is any way of limiting or definitively abolishing the trafficking of people who go to Tanzania in search of work, to keep them in the province to farm its land.