Tanzanian president urges SADC member states to address food insecurity
Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan on Monday urged member states of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) to take deliberate measures aimed at addressing food insecurity facing most of the countries in the region.
The solution to food insecurity is for the SADC countries to invest heavily in agriculture, Hassan said at the opening of the 53rd Plenary Assembly Session of the SADC Parliamentary Forum in Tanzania’s northern city of Arusha.
“It is rather sad to learn that more than 50 million people in the SADC region are food insecure, despite the fact that we have nearly 9.9 million square kilometers of arable land capable of producing bumper harvests,” she said.
Hassan said Tanzania is increasing its annual agricultural budgets with a view to boosting food production by improving irrigation farming and the use of technology.
The SADC was established in 1992 to address regional integration and poverty eradication within southern Africa through economic development and ensuring peace and security.
It groups Angola, Botswana, Comoros, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Eswatini, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
