Rural electrification benefits plenty, says energy minister

Mbeya. Energy minister January Makamba says government’s goal of transmitting electricity to every village is to balance the development between urban and rural areas, saying that the fruits of the process have started to be seen.

The minister made the statement yesterday when he visited Kuza Africa Limited, a factory that produces avocado edible oil and related products.

Currently, the factory has been electrified and has since stopped using fuels for power generation.

In his statement, Mr Makamba said the factory was a good example of the fruits of the project of transmiting electricity to rural areas. The factory employs 30 people. The factory avocado farm employs over 200 people.

“The avocados used as raw materials at the factory are those categorised as reject, because these areas grow the crop for export. Before being exported, the fruits are inspected and those that don’t fit to be exported, are taken for oil making,” said the minister.

“The rejected avocados that a farmer could have lost, he sells to this investor. For example, if a farmer harvested 20 tonnes, and a half is categorised as reject, then this could have been lost had this factory not been there,” added the minister. He said the government will continue pushing rural electrification to allow investors engage in other businesses and hence transform lives of people.

“We are relieved when we see the fruits of such a big job of transmitting electricity, which has great results, especially for the citizens.

“So, I promise this investor and others that we will transmit the electricity of high voltage to their plants in accordance with their needs,” said Mr Makamba.

Rungwe MP Anthony Mwantola thanked the minister for the visit, saying that if electricity reaches all the villages in the district, then there would be many industries like that of Kuza.

“We welcome more investors to Rungwe because the residents here grow avocados in abundance. If you go to every village, you will find avocados being cultivated there. We are sure that when electricity reaches every area there will be more factories to create jobs to the residents,” said Mr Mwantola.

Rungwe district Tanesco manager Mukhsin Kijemkuu said the investor would receive adequate electricity to run his factory.

“We transmitted electricity to his factory so that he could have a transformer of his own, before this process he was producing 2,000 litres of avocado oil per day but now he will be producing 4,000 litres per day. He was using 250 litres of diesel fuel per day and paid Sh24 million for fuel per month, but after getting electricity the cost has decreased substatially.

Kuza Africa managing director Rob Clowes thanked the minister for visiting the factory and thanked Tanesco in Rungwe District for transmitting electricity to the area.

He also encouraged the residents of the district to grow more avocados, saying that he was in need of them in abundance due to the reliable market for the product.