Gender, politics and sugarcane commercialisation in Tanzania

ABSTRACT

This article explores relationships between state, corporate capital and local stakeholders in the political economy of sugarcane from a gender perspective. The findings, based on empirical research at the site of Tanzania’s largest sugarcane producer pre- and post-privatisation, provide insights into the degree to which the estate-outgrower model can be regarded as ‘inclusive’ for women and men. Three aspects of commercial sugarcane production are analysed: land tenure, labour and leadership within canegrowers’ associations. We argue that politico-economic changes in the sector post-privatisation have increased gender differentiation in sugarcane production and consolidated power in the hands of local elites.

KEYWORDS:

• Agricultural commercialisation
• gender
• outgrowing
• political economy
• sugar
• Tanzania

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank the many individuals who assisted them in their fieldwork in Kilombero and Dar es Salaam, including the villagers and leaders of Msolwa Ujamaa and Sanje villages, representatives and employees at Kilombero Sugar Company Limited, the Kilombero branch of the Tanzania Plantation and Agriculture Workers’ Union, the Sugar Board of Tanzania, Kilombero outgrowers’ associations and local government officials from Morogoro Regional Commissioners’ Office and Kilombero District Council who granted permission for the conduct of the research. Special thanks are due to our co-researcher in the field, Rebecca Smalley, to our field assistants Lameck Malale and Prisca Peter Kiganza; and to Ruth Hall, Marjorie Mbilinyi, Katherine Snyder and Elizabeth Harrison for their valuable comments during the research process. We are grateful to Faustin Maganga and the University of Dar es Salaam for facilitating our fieldwork. We thank the anonymous reviewers and journal editor for their valuable comments on an earlier version of this article. This article draws upon the authors’ preliminary findings published in an earlier Future Agricultures working paper Gender implications of agricultural commercialisation: The case of sugarcane production in Kilombero District, Tanzania (Future Agricultures, 2015).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 From 2013 to 2016, Emmanuel Sulle made two trips per year to Kilombero for an average of two weeks per visit. Both authors visited for two weeks in April 2014.

2 Villagers self-declared the size of their plots during the household surveys. While self-declared figures are necessarily approximate, they are supported by interview data on plot sizes obtained from the company and canegrowers’ associations.

Additional information

Funding

The fieldwork for this research was supported by the Future Agricultures Consortium, funded by the Department for International Development UK. Emmanuel Sulle received additional PhD scholarships from Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) then PHD Small Grant, Doctoral Student Research Fellowship with Evidence for Policy Design (EPoD) at Harvard University PhD Fellowship and IFMR LEAD and the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs for the Hierarchies of Rights: Land and Natural Resource Investments in Africa Research Programme co-implemented by the University of Dar Es Salaam, Eduardo Mondlane and Roskilde University.

Notes on contributors

Emmanuel Sulle

Emmanuel Sulle is a research associate and PhD Candidate at the Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, University of the Western Cape, South Africa. His research focuses on the politics of inclusive business models in land-based investments, land tenure and rural livelihood. Email: [email protected].

Helen Dancer

Helen Dancer is lecturer in law and AHRC leadership fellow at the University of Sussex. Her research interests centre on human-Earth relationships, gender and justice. She is the author of Women, Land and Justice in Tanzania (James Currey, 2015). Email: [email protected].