Tanzania needs a foreign market for its sales of agricultural products

He said that the arrival of the Executive Director of WFP was an excellent opportunity for Tanzanians to take advantage of the agriculture, conservation and sale of their agricultural products in foreign markets.

The Prime Minister spoke in Dar es Salaam yesterday meeting with the WFP leader, expressing an optimistic view that a huge agricultural surplus was likely this year and that the country needed foreign markets to sell its crops.

"We have to sell our surplus to foreign markets because we expect a huge food surplus this year," he said, citing reports from agricultural sector agencies.

Departmental data suggest that Tanzania will have a surplus of 3 million tons this harvest season, as it expects to harvest 16 million tons of corn, beans and pigeon peas.

"Until this month, farmers were still harvesting their crops, we have already recorded a surplus of one million tons of crops," he said, noting that the reports show that that Tanzania has already harvested 14 million tonnes.

WFP had agreed to buy surplus food from Tanzania, which assured Tanzanians that their crops guaranteed a reliable market as purchases of crops such as maize would be made by ministerial agencies and WFP.

The government has already built maize silo warehouses in a number of areas to store enough food according to the recommended standards, said the prime minister

The WFP chief has already visited the districts of Songea, Namtumbo and Madaba at Ruvuma. region to see for itself the exceptional harvest, especially for maize.

"The government needs to focus on building modern corn silos for storing crops," said the prime minister.

Beasley, a former governor of the US state of South Carolina (as a Republican and Democrat until 1991) is in the country for a seven-day official visit.