Kilimo Kwanza

Features

Twenty Names, One Mission: Inside the World Agriculture Forum’s New Country Director Bench — and What It Means for Global Food Systems

April 19, 2026 · Kilimokwanza · 19 min read

The Netherlands-headquartered World Agriculture Forum has named twenty Country Directors across Africa, Asia, the Gulf, Europe and the Americas. The appointments mark the operational launch of its national…

Africa

Tanzania Exports Raw. It Is Time to Export Rich.

April 17, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 3 min read

By Kilimokwanza Tanzania’s agricultural export performance has been one of the sector’s genuine success stories in recent years. The value of export crops nearly tripled from USD 1.2…

Africa

60 Percent of the Workforce, Less Than Full Opportunity: The Case for Youth in Tanzania’s Agriculture

April 16, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 3 min read

By Elizabeth Shumbusho Agriculture feeds Tanzania. And Tanzania’s youth — statistically — feed agriculture. Young people aged 15 to 35 make up 62.4 percent of Tanzania’s active workforce.…

Features

The Day a Banana Farm in Kilosa Changed the Conversation About Poverty in Morogoro

April 15, 2026 · Kilimokwanza · 7 min read

It began, as many revolutions do, with something ordinary. Praxeda Melkior, co-founder of Migeto Farm in Kilosa district, had planted lemongrass — mchai chai — between her banana…

Africa

Tanzania Grows More Than Ever. Why Aren’t Farmers Richer?

April 15, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 3 min read

By Charles Mwangi Tanzania achieved food self-sufficiency in 2025. It is a milestone worth celebrating — the country now produces enough food to feed its population and is…

Features

From Breeding Line to Kitchen Garden: How New Amaranth and Eggplant Varieties Are Reaching Tanzania’s Smallholders

April 15, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 5 min read

By Kilimokwanza Somewhere in a research station in Tanzania, a plant breeder is looking at rows of amaranth. Each row is a slightly different genetic line, tested across…

Features

Kenya Airways Subsidiary Takes to the Fields: Fahari Aviation and CropLife Kenya Sign Drone Agriculture Deal

April 15, 2026 · Kilimokwanza · 4 min read

A new partnership between an aviation company and a crop protection body signals Kenya’s serious pivot toward precision farming — and raises the question of whether the sky…

Features

Half of It Never Reaches Anyone: Tanzania’s Quiet Postharvest Crisis and the Informal Traders Who Can Fix It

April 15, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 4 min read

By Kilimokwanza Every tomato that rots in a crate before it reaches a market stall is a double loss. It is income that a farmer will not receive,…

Features

Tomato Yields Up 144%: What Happens When Farmers in Northern Tanzania Switch to Better Practices

April 14, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 4 min read

By Kilimokwanza There is a persistent assumption in agricultural development circles that reducing chemical inputs means accepting lower yields. It is an assumption rooted in a version of…

Features

You Can’t Eat What Isn’t There: How Tanzania’s Market Stalls Are Stocked Against a Healthy Diet

April 14, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 4 min read

By Kilimokwanza There is a tendency, when discussing poor nutrition in Africa, to frame the problem as one of individual choice: people eat badly because they do not…

Africa

35 Grams: Tanzania’s Fruit Problem in a Single Number

April 13, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 4 min read

By Kilimokwanza Thirty-five grams. That is roughly a quarter of a small mango. Half an orange. Two modest slices of papaya. It is the average amount of fruit…

Africa

Tanzania’s Farmers Are Online — But the Money Isn’t Following

April 13, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 3 min read

By Kilimokwanza Tanzania has a mobile money success story that much of the world envies. Seven in ten adults use mobile money services. Financial access points now sit…

Africa

Why Tanzania’s Wealthiest Women Are Also Its Most Overweight: The Obesity Paradox in Arusha and Kilimanjaro

April 13, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 3 min read

There is a story we tell ourselves about hunger and body weight in Africa, and it goes roughly like this: poverty causes undernutrition, and wealth brings better diets.…

Africa

From SAGCOT to AGCOT: Can Tanzania’s Partnership Model Scale Up?

April 13, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 3 min read

By Elizabeth Shumbusho In 2010, Tanzania launched an ambitious experiment. The Southern Agricultural Growth Corridor of Tanzania — SAGCOT — set out to bring government, business, development partners,…

Features

Tanzania’s Vegetable Crisis: What CGIAR Research Reveals About What Women in Arusha and Kilimanjaro Are and Are Not Eating

April 12, 2026 · Kilimokwanza · 6 min read

Seven research briefs from the CGIAR Science Program on Better Diets and Nutrition paint a detailed and troubling picture: nearly all women surveyed consume far below the recommended…

Africa

The Pressure Nobody Talks About: Six in Ten Women in Kilimanjaro Have Abnormal Blood Pressure, and Most Have Never Been Told

April 12, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 4 min read

By Kilimokwanza Mama Amina wakes before dawn to prepare breakfast for her family before the long walk to the shamba. She has never felt sick, not in any…

Africa

43% of Tomato Farmers Use Chemical Pesticides. Every Farmer Producing Over 100kg Uses Both Fertiliser and Pesticides.

April 12, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 4 min read

By Kilimokwanza There is a convenient assumption buried in conversations about vegetable production and nutrition in Africa: that more vegetables, grown by more farmers, is unambiguously good for…

Africa

Three Quarters of Fruit-Farming Households in Northern Tanzania Grow Bananas. Almost Nobody Grows Anything Else.

April 11, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 4 min read

By Kilimokwanza If Tanzania’s vegetable farming is dominated by a small number of crops, its fruit farming is dominated by a single one. The July 2025 research brief…

Africa

Arusha Farms More Intensively. Kilimanjaro Grows Differently. The FRESH Baseline Reveals a Regional Divide That Policy Cannot Ignore.

April 11, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 4 min read

By Kilimokwanza Arusha and Kilimanjaro sit beside each other on the map, share a climate zone shaped by Mount Kilimanjaro, and are often grouped together in development programming.…

Africa

Widely Eaten, Barely Grown: Why Only 3% of Farmers in Arusha and Kilimanjaro Cultivate African Eggplant

April 10, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 4 min read

By Kilimokwanza Walk into a kitchen in Arusha or Kilimanjaro and you are likely to encounter African eggplant. Known locally as nyanya chungu, or bitter tomato, it appears…

Features

How the Potato Council of Tanzania Is Driving a Potato Transformation That Changes Lives

April 10, 2026 · Kilimokwanza · 15 min read

A humble tuber grown in the mists of the Southern Highlands is quietly transforming the fortunes of thousands of Tanzanian families. With the founding of the Potato Council…

Africa

Farmers Are Getting 4.5 Tons Per Hectare. Field Trials Show 27.7 Is Possible. What Is Going Wrong With Tanzania’s Amaranth?

April 10, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 4 min read

By Kilimokwanza Amaranth, known in Kiswahili as mchicha, is one of the most nutritionally dense leafy vegetables grown in East Africa. Rich in iron, calcium, protein, and vitamins…

Africa

Tanzania’s Farmers Are Growing Tomatoes to Sell, Not to Eat: 87% of Production Goes Straight to Market

April 9, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 4 min read

By Kilimokwanza On a typical vegetable farm in Arusha or Kilimanjaro, tomatoes occupy a special place. They are grown on nearly half the plot dedicated to them, almost…

Africa

The Staple Crop Trap: 79% of Farming Households Grow Maize. Only 41% Grow Vegetables. And Just 14% Grow Any Fruit at All.

April 9, 2026 · Elizabeth Lizz · 4 min read

By Kilimokwanza Correspondent The question of why so few Tanzanians eat enough fruit and vegetables is often framed as a market problem, a behaviour problem, or an affordability…