“Thanks to Fairtrade, we have changed our agricultural techniques which have improved the quality and quantity of our teas. We have opened new access roads to benefit all in the community, assisted in providing primary health care through construction of health units and added a new block to a local secondary school. Fairtrade is significantly contributing towards the social improvement of our community and providing a better future for our youngsters.”
Silver Kasoro-Atwoki, Committee chairman and Director 

Introduction

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Mabale Growers Tea Factory Ltd is located at an altitude of around 1,500 metres on the lower slopes of the Rwenzori Mountains near Fort Portal, one of Uganda’s main tea growing areas. It incorporates a tea processing factory and two tea estates that were previously owned and operated by the state but were abandoned during the chaos of the Amin regime and its aftermath in the 1970s and 1980s. They have since been renovated, rehabilitated and privatised under the government Smallholder Tea Programme which also saw the ownership pass to an association of 1,000 shareholders, mostly small-scale tea farmers who supply the factory with their green leaf tea.

Apart from small volumes of Fairtrade and local sales, most of the made (processed) tea is sold to international buyers via the Mombasa auction. While a drought in Kenya has led to a temporary rise in prices during 2006, prices at Mombasa are generally following the worldwide long-term downward trend which, with all other costs rising, makes it very difficult for tea growers to make a decent living.

Mr Silver Kasoro-Atwoki

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Mr Kasoro-Atwoki is a tea grower and shareholder in the Mabale Growers Tea Factory. He is also a Director and Board member of the factory as well as Chairman of its Premium Committee, the elected panel which decides how to invest the Fairtrade premium, the additional payment reserved for business and social development projects. In March 2006 Mr Kasoro-Atwoki toured the UK during Fairtrade Fortnight, the Foundation’s annual awareness-raising campaign, when he explained how Fairtrade is helping the farmers to improve their business and farming methods and provide community services. He was elected on to the Board of the Fairtrade Foundation in June 2006 as a representative of African producers.

Until retiring in 2001, Mr Kasoro-Atwoki, 53, was a professional counsellor and senior psychiatric clinical officer and his wife is a senior nursing officer at nearby Fort Portal hospital. They have five girls and three boys aged between 15 and 26. Four are in school, two are at university and the two eldest also have careers in the nursing profession.

Mr Kasoro-Atwoki’s farm was previously run as a joint enterprise by his father, brothers and family friends and he bought it in 1998 when his father died and the group went their separate ways. He grows on average 3,500kg of green leaf a month and also grows coffee for the market. Like most tea farmers he grows much of the family’s food - bananas, beans, cassava, maize and potatoes - a great financial saving and necessity for small-scale tea growers.
While primary education is free in Uganda, parents have to pay for secondary and college education unless their children win a scholarship. The cash income from his tea has been vital in providing his children with a good education.

How is Fairtrade Helping?

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Mabale supplies tea for Teadirect, Traidcraft and Tesco own label blends. As well as a fair price equal to or higher than the auction price, each kilo attracts a Fairtrade premium of €0.50. The agreed priority of the elected Premium Committee is to provide better health and education services and improve the general living standards of the farmers. They concluded that one of the best ways of achieving these aims would be by increasing farmers' incomes. They have consequently invested premium funds in training in agricultural techniques that improve the quality of the tea to increase the price received. Investment in nurseries and tea seedlings mean that farmers are also able to increase the numbers of tea trees on their plots.

It is essential that freshly picked green leaf tea reaches the tea factory in good condition within a few hours of being picked. Fifteen leaf collection sheds have been built at roadsides so that farmers can store their green leaf in cool, dry conditions, whatever the weather, while waiting to be collected by the factory’s lorries. In many cases this has also meant constructing or improving access roads to supplier tea farms. This of course benefits the wider community by helping other farmers get their produce to market.

A new workers’ facility is under construction at the factory – toilets, changing rooms, rest room and canteen – with the roof due to be put on in spring 2006.

In partnership with the government, the farmers have constructed a healthcare unit with dispensary at the factory. They also support another clinic in the area by supplying equipment and medicines.

The premium has been used to part-fund, with the school and parents, a new block at Buhemba Secondary School. The office and two classrooms are completed and in the process of being equipped, ready to open in spring 2006.

The area the tea farms are located in is very rural with poor infrastructure. Less than 1% of homes have electricity or running water. Most people get their water from shallow wells, springs or bore holes but less than 50% have easy access to safe, clean water. In 2006, the factory is prioritising the provision of safe water in the community through the construction and protection of shallow wells and springs.

These are just some of the projects funded by Fairtrade sales that are making a difference to the lives of farming communities in Uganda.

Mabale Tea Growers Factory

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Eighty percent of the factory’s shareholders are small-scale subsistence farmers with less than two hectares who also supply the factory with their freshly picked green leaf tea. Their farms are located up to 30km from the factory and they depend on tea for 50-60% of their cash income. Mabale competes with 11 privately-owned tea factories in the area to buy in green leaf from local growers. The factory employs 101 permanent and 107 temporary workers. It also owns the Nyamasoga and Mparo tea plantations which employ 45 permanent and 73 temporary workers.

In the early 1970s Uganda was second only to Kenya in African tea production. But production declined catastrophically between 1971 and 1986 when many fields and factories were abandoned during the chaos of the Amin years and the guerrilla war that followed. Since 1989, tea rehabilitation projects have included the transfer of state-owned factories like Mabale to smallholders who gradually bought shares by means of a small deduction from every sale of green leaf to the factory. A management company was contracted to run Mabale in 1994 and rehabilitate the tea fields, improve quality and increase processing capacity. Over time, the shareholders acquired the commercial and technical expertise to appoint their own Board which took over management in 2002. A big investment was made in 2004 to install a new production line that was needed to keep up with increasing volume and quality requirements.

Fairtrade Foundation 2008

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