Agricultural policies in Mainland Tanzania

Abstract

The years 1946–76 cover the last fifteen years of colonial rule in Tanganyika, and the first fifteen years of Independence. In that period Governments attempted a wide range of policies relating to agriculture. The more important of these are summarised in Table 1. This paper attempts to bring out the historical sequence to show how the perceived weaknesses in one set of policies led to the choice of the next. A general conclusion is that those who controlled the State consistently misunderstood fundamental aspects of peasant agriculture, and over‐estimated what the use of State power could achieve in rural development. More specifically the paper charts a conflict of interest between peasants and bureaucrats beginning in colonial times and continuing today. From a bureaucratic point of view, the peasants are an important section of the economy which they cannot fully control, but which they must attempt to manipulate to extract a surplus of food to feed the cities and export crops to extract the foreign exchange to maintain or expand the State. The peasants view the bureaucrats with mixed feelings: they know that the bureaucrats possess power — to set prices for crops or call in the police force, but they are uncomfortably aware that that power is often used to exploit their labour power.