Mr. Chairman,
Distinguished Governors and Delegated,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

I bring greetings from Tanzania to this august assembly, which I have the honour to address. I congratulate Dr. Kanayo Nwanze for his re-election as the President of IFAD.  This re-election by acclamation was a confirmation of the strong support your leadership enjoys, including the support from my own government. We shall continue to be IFAD’s partner and a firm supporter of its activities.

Mr. Chairman, the discussions on the theme of this year’s Governing Council were very useful. While thanking IFAD for the great organization, we congratulate all panellists for their lively sharing and for the opportunity to continue learning from the best practices of the partnerships that are truly working for smallholder farmers.

Mr. Chairman, my country is currently implementing reforms that are very important in transforming   our agricultural sector which remains the predominant occupation of the majority of the country’s population. It is increasingly drawing partners to smallholder farmers. We are scaling up participation with the private sector which has a great role in hastening the growth of the agricultural sector through the corridor approach that we have adopted.

In collaboration with the private sector, the government has initiated the first corridor known as the Southern Agricultural Growth of Tanzania (SAGCOT) through which the implementation of the transformation in the rural economy with five clusters has started. The Kilombero cluster dealing with rice and sugarcane is performing very well. For example, it is gratifying to already see smallholder out growers in partnership with large scale farmers and an increase in paddy productivity from an average of 2 to 6 tonnes per hectare. This partnership through nucleus farming is currently covering 3,200 out growers against the target of 5,000.

Mr. Chairman, through the  IFAD Country office, we have started reviewing Tanzania’s result-based Country Strategic Opportunities Programme (COSOP) guided by IFAD’s objective of getting 80 million people out of poverty. In further strengthening our partnership, we request for further support through the Programme Approach to complement our initiatives.  We also understand that South-South cooperation is one of the important commitments of the IFAD 9th replenishment, to which we wish a successful widespread.

Mr. Chairman, I conclude by thanking you and this august assembly for your kind attention.