The Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries (MAAIF) is set to purchase of seven (7) million hand hoes for farmers. This is after Parliament approved UGX26.12bn supplementary budget for the same purpose.
This was during the 2nd December 2025 plenary sitting in which Parliament considered and approved three supplementary expenditures to the tune of UGX 8.104.39Trn.
The Ministry of Agriculture sought additional funds to buy hand hoes on grounds that their request wasn’t allocated enough funds during the 2025/26 budgeting process.
However, Joel Ssenyonyi, the Leader of Opposition, questioned the timing of the purchase noting, “In the year 2025, we still want to purchase hand held hoes for people and yet we are talking about modernising agriculture, but we want to purchase 7million hand hoes.”
However, Speaker Anita Among defended the purchase noting, “There are areas that can’t use the other kind of tractors, if you look at a place like Sebei, you don’t need those tractors, you need those hand hoes.”
Ssenyonyi hit back, noting: “…As far as I am concerned, saying that we are spending UGX26bn to buy hand hoes especially during this electoral period, there are so many question marks. “
Fred Bwino. Minister of State for Agriculture informed the Budget Committee earlier that only UGX5bn had been provided for in the 2025/26 budget towards this activity, but it wasn’t adequate, thus the request for additional funds in the supplementary budget.
“…The Cabinet decision was that the Ministry should provide at least one hand hoe per household for three consecutive years because it wasn’t possible for Government to find enough money to procure at once and yet a household has more than one person, so we shall come back with more request in the next financial year. The money was received and the procurement process was concluded.”
