Abstract
The plight of the smallholder cotton farmer in the Rwenzori region of western Uganda starts with the unfair terms of hiring land for cultivation. The next hurdle is the loss of ownership of the cotton at the earliest stage of the value chain after delivering the produce to the ginner. Even the Fairtrade standards base the minimum price for the farmer on delivery of seed cotton at the ginnery, implying that the farmer is not expected to participate in the value chain and share the accruing value additions further up the chain. However, members of the Rwenzori Farmers' marketing Co-operative Society decided to move a step up the value chain by hiring the ginning services and, hence, retained the ownership of both the lint and cotton seed, which improved their income by at least 30 per cent. The strategy is to find investors to enable them to spin the cotton and manufacture the final products.
Highlights
The plight of the smallholder cotton farmer in the Rwenzori region of western Uganda starts with the unfair terms of hiring land for cultivation
Even the Fairtrade standards base the minimum price for the farmer on delivery of seed cotton at the ginnery, implying that the farmer is not expected to participate in the value chain and share the accruing value additions further up the chain
The cotton producers in the Rwenzori region of western Uganda are mainly migrant farmers whose permanent homes are in the hard-to-reach areas of the Rwenzori mountain ranges (Mountains of the Moon)
Summary
The cotton producers in the Rwenzori region of western Uganda are mainly migrant farmers whose permanent homes are in the hard-to-reach areas of the Rwenzori mountain ranges (Mountains of the Moon). As Mr Friday Muhindo (first chairman of the co-operative) said in 2013 in the group formation meeting: ‘we grew up with our parents living this kind of life’ In most cases, they got a raw deal from the unscrupulous agents of the landlords due to poor bargaining power. One of the farmers’ groups, Rwenzori Farmers Marketing Co-operative Society Ltd (RWEFAMACOS), has been Fairtrade certified since 2014 but it has not sold more than 600 metric tons of cotton to the Fairtrade market in nearly seven years of its certification as a Fairtrade certified producer organisation.
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