NAADS distributes HASS avocado & Macadamia Seedlings worth Ush 1.5B to farmers.
Following the onset of rains in most parts of Uganda, the National Agricultural Advisory Services
(NAADS) has commenced distribution of macadamia and hass avocado planting materials to
farmers in a bid to scale up the production of the two high value crops.
Government of Uganda through NAADS is promoting the production of Hass Avocado and
Macadamia through the Nucleus Farmer Approach. In this approach the nucleus farmers have
been contracted to produce and distribute high quality seedlings of recommended varieties of
Hass Avocado and Macadamia to out growers upon payment of 30% of the seedling costs.
In this season, NAADS is distributing 193,453 seedlings of Hass Avocado and 60,000
Macadamia to farmers in 62 District Local Governments; who have expressed interest to plant
the seed. The deliveries of seedlings are being made to farmer beneficiaries under the
supervision of NAADS and the District Local Governments.
More than ……. farmers in 53 districts have benefited from this support from Government and
these are located in Acholi, West Nile, Lango, Teso, Western, Busoga & far east, Central, Tooro
and West Buganda sub regions.
Out of this intervention, 1,200 acres of Hass avocado and 800 acres of macadamia are
expected to be established countrywide.
Macadamia and hass avocado are some of the Uganda’s emerging non-traditional cash crops
with enormous potential to contribute not only to the growth of the agricultural sector but
increase the country’s foreign exchange earnings and improve household incomes.
Macadamia is the most popular and expensive nut in the world today with an oil content of up to
67 percent while Hass avocado has over 14 percent oil. Hass avocado has a high global
demand and was valued at US$12.8bn in 2019 and is expected to rise to US$17.9BN BY 2025.
Through NAADS, government is promoting and scaling up the production of these emerging
high value strategic commodities working with large scale farmers with land holdings of 50 acres
and above to promote massive production to meet both local and export demand.
Through the Nucleus Farmer Partnership strategy, NAADS has partnered with eight large scale
producers of the two crops to enable and enhance access to quality planting materials of
macadamia and Hass avocado to the small holder farmers/out-growers. Through this strategy,
the small holder farmers access the relevant agricultural support services including extension,
research and technology, storage, processing and value addition, market information and
market for produce, financial and insurance from the big producers.
This strategic intervention is being implemented under a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU)
with the Parties to the MOU who include NAADS Secretariat, the Nucleus Farmer/Farm, the
District Local Government in which the Nucleus farmer is located and has a concentration of
activities for the out growers.
Government allocated funds for the promotion of partnerships with big commercial
farmer’s/nucleus farmers to produce strategic commodities including Macadamia among other
enterprises. The funds are aimed at scaling up production of these commodities to take
advantage of the growing, national, regional, and international markets.
Implementation of this intervention started during Season 2022B and was in part guided by
findings and recommendations of a baseline study conducted early last year.