OVER the last several decades, food insecurity in Africa and poverty rates has grown. In 2020, Africa Centre for Strategic Studies revealed that more than 100 million Africans faced extremely level of food insecurity with quarter of billion people in Africa experiencing hunger in 2019.
While malnourishment and starvation are among Africa’s problems, farmers and growers are unfortunately struggling to meet the food demand of the continent’s growing population, with factors such as drought, instability and the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbating the situation.
Thus, Juncao technology has the ability to answer and solve those problems by helping farmers to grow food in unfavorable environments. Juncao technology was founded in the 1980s by Prof Lin Zhanxi of Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University (FAFU).
The meaning of the word Juncao in Chinese; JUN is Mushroom, CAO is Grass. Being one of its poverty reduction initiatives, China introduced Juncao grass in 2004 to Africa to help African countries use Juncao grass to increase food and livestock production. The aim was to help African countries address food insecurity and fight against poverty.
For Tanzania, Juncao grass was introduced in 2016, but its official introduction took place in 2021. JUNCAO is a hybrid grass as well as an important multi-functional agricultural resource.
Its leaves, stems and roots can be used for different types of ecological management, such as controlling soil erosion and preventing desertification. They can also be used for mushroom cultivation, or as animal feed and chicken feed, to produce fertilizers, biomass energy, biological materials, etc.
China’s Juncao Technology is the bridge connecting China’s foreign cooperation in poverty alleviation. The technology is of great importance to Tanzania and Africa in increasing employment, promoting the rural economy, eliminating poverty and fighting malnutrition.
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Juncao grass has a crude protein of 18.6 percent, can be harvested more than five times each year, has an annual yield of about 180 tons per acre and takes 12 weeks to mature.
Juncao technology is a low-cost technology that can help Tanzania realize food security and reduce poverty among poor rural people in the country. If the use of Juncao technology is prioritized, it can contribute to combating malnutrition in the country, which is rampant among poor households.
The agricultural sector in Tanzania is considered the backbone of the economy due to the fact that it employs more people than any other sector. Since most Tanzanians live in rural areas and earn a living from agriculture, this sector must be diversified and modernised to increase farmers’ income and food security.
This is something to consider since many of our people suffer from nutritional problems and other problems, which can be avoided by regularly eating a variety of foods including edible mushrooms.
Eating mushrooms regularly is a medicine and prevention of diseases, some mushrooms are medicines, some are immune boosters, some have the ability to fight cancer, some control diabetes, or blood pressure, and more. If communities are empowered to be given mushroom seeds, and appropriated technologies through training, they can grow mushrooms for food throughout the year and for sale and get cash to meet their other needs.
In addition to that, but also, mushroom farming can contribute to addressing the three Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations (UN SDGs), that is, ending poverty, ending hunger, achieving food security and improving nutrition and promoting sustainable agriculture, ensuring the livelihood of health and promote well-being for all at all ages.
Since Juncao technology is a combination of various packages, at some point it is impossible to start with all sectors at once. It is possible to choose a few sectors to start with, such as mushroom cultivation and animal husbandry, which all deals with food security, poverty reduction and the fight against malnutrition.
Due to its advantages, mushroom cultivation can be one of the two areas that the government should prioritize and encourage people to grow them in abundance, but at the same time, the Government should help find markets so that farmers have a reliable place to sell their mushrooms.
Also, the Government should increase efforts to publicize the benefits of mushrooms and encourage Tanzanians to start eating mushrooms for their health. I personally believe that, if people realize its benefits, they will start using mushrooms in their homes, hotels and expand the mushroom market in the country.
The availability and assurance of mushroom’s markets will push farmers to cultivate more mushrooms in abundance. In addition to mushroom cultivation, another very important sector that the Government should prioritize in its strategies to reduce poverty and increase food security and nation income is animal husbandry.
Animal husbandry is a very important sector that can contribute to the increase of the national income, breeders and traders of livestock and meat. According to the FAO 2016 report, global demand for meat and dairy products is expected to increase by 40% – 52% by 2050.
This percentage that is expected to increase is a great opportunity for Tanzania, for breeders and for livestock traders.
Thus, if the cultivation of Juncao grass is given priority and farmers are empowered to cultivate this grass in abundance, it will help in increasing the number of different types of livestock in the country. The great advantage of Juncao grass is that these grasses do not use high costs in the entire process of planting, harvesting and processing.
Although Juncao grass takes a short period of time to reach its harvesting age, but also has great ability to tolerate drought and grows in any type of soil. Another great advantage of Juncao grass is that one acre of the grass can feed 30-40 cows, and 500 goats or sheep throughout the year.
Although Juncao grass require less land to feed many animals, but also, they can be used as a tool to resolve conflicts between farmers and herders, which has been a serious and permanent problem in their communities. It is in fact that, these conflicts are caused by the lack of sufficient land to feed livestock, but also due to the increase of population, and thus, the increase in the demand for land for farming.
All these factors have been leading to the migration of herders from one place to another and thus causing more conflicts. It is important to note that, although Tanzania is the second largest country with the most livestock in Africa, but its level of milk production is still very low.
Data from the Tanzania Dairy Board (DB) shows that the production of milk in the country per year is 3.6 billion litres, while the demand is 12 billion litres; this means that Tanzania has a deficit of 9 billion litres every year.
Due to the huge shortage of milk, we have, the annual consumption per citizen in the country is only 45 litres instead of 100 litres for a child and 200 litres for an adult.
At the same time, The International Farm Comparison Network (IFCN), predicts that, by the year 2030, there will be a shortage of 6 billion tons of milk worldwide.
These expectations are based on the assumption that world milk production will increase by 21.5% or 126 million tons, while global demand will increase by 22% or 140 million tons due to the growth of the middle class in developing countries.
From these figures, it is clear that the shortage of milk will increase in Tanzania as well. But, if Juncao grass is widely publicized and its cultivation is widely promoted in the country, it can certainly help to reduce the shortage of milk in the country by increasing the breeding of milk cows and goats. In addition to its advantage, but also, Juncao leaves have the ability to absorb Carbon Dioxide Emission and have the ability to prevent soil erosion.
Thus, if they are planted on the banks of rivers, they can help to a large extent to prevent those rivers from expanding further.
In general, Juncao grass can increase the farmers’ and herders’ livestock and mushrooms productivity, increase their income, improve their livelihoods and reduce poverty for the rural community.
Thus, Tanzania and African countries should take advantage of Juncao grass and collaborate more with China so it can share with us its experience and knowledge on how to use Juncao grass to increase food production, reduce poverty and malnutrition.
The writer is a Dar es Salaam-based analyst on international politics and foreign relations. He can be reached through cleophacegeorge@gmail.com