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The State Minister of Agriculture, Fred Bwino Kyakulaga, while speaking to journalists at the government media centre this week, said that according to the international market Uganda is ranked second in producing quality vanilla after Madagascar the top producer.
He said that because of the unique Uganda environment compared to the rest of the world, if the country's vanilla is allowed to mature its value will be higher (based on increased vanillin) than that from anywhere on the globe.
The current export value of vanilla as of March 2023 is $8.33 million (89,038 tonnes) according to the Uganda Export Promotion Board. The minister said that this performance has firmly positioned Uganda as a competitive origin of quality vanilla on the global market.
It is on such a background that the minister has set July 17 as the commencement of the vanilla harvest season A of this year.
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On the security front, there have been issues like theft of vanilla beans, robbery, murders, premature harvesting, and trade in poor quality premature beans, all of which have compromised the vanilla in the country.
According to Kyakulaga, this pattern has also been exacerbated by farmers looking to get a return on their investment thus resorting to early harvesting.
On their side, the police has said that there is a big ratio of farmers to police personnel in favour of farmers. Rosemary Nanyonga Commissioner of Police and the commandant of Agricultural Police said that there are 65,000 Vanilla farmers in the country compared to the 45,000 police personnel.
She said Police are to call a security meeting and map out a way of stopping vanilla theft cases. She also said that the Agricultural Police will coordinate with the Resident District Commissioners, and other security agencies to apprehend those who violate the harvest timeline.
According to Agar Ssekalaala Junior of Vanix Uganda, an exporter of vanilla, based on the survey from the last 3 years, Uganda has 65,000 farmers in 35 districts and Uganda and supplies to the global market between 100 to 200 metric tons every year.