Cashew’s union to spend 79 percent of budget on paying debts

Dar es Salaam. The Tandahimba and Newala Cooperative Union (Tanecu) is expected to spend 79 percent of development budget in the 2022/23 Financial Year for debts servicing.

Tanecu’s 2022/23 budget was recently tabled before members of the Annual General Meeting (AGM) for endorsement showing that Sh6.895 billion would be collected in the coming financial  year.

The budget document availed to The Citizen shows that of estimated collections, the union was expected to spend Sh6.810 billion for recurrent and implementation of development activities.

Furthermore, the document shows that at a total of Sh3.360 billion was anticipated amount to be collected for implementation of development projects and that all the collections would be utilised.
Furthermore, the document shows that Sh2.652 billion of all funds allocated for implementation of development activities would be used for servicing debts it owes various cashews stakeholders in the country.
The remaining Sh286.473 million and Sh421.45 million will respectively be used for investment and procurement of permanent properties.
Furthermore, Sh732.250 million would be used to service a debt it owes the Cashewnut Board of Tanzania (CBT) being part of the money secured from the Tanzania Investment Bank (TIB) for purchasing cashew trees spraying equipment.
The other Sh71.515 million would be paid to Bonanza Vietnam as well as Sh450.877 million disbursed to the Tanzania Fertilisers Company (TFC) for agriculture inputs supplied to it.
Others companies that would receive the payments following services offered and respective amount in bracket are Export Trading (Sh499.620 million) for supplied inputs and Mohamed Enterprises (Sh300 million) for supplied packaging materials.
Others are the ICS System (Sh155.609 million) for supplied moisture measuring equipment and weighing machines as well as the Tanzania Revenue Authority (TRA-Sh355.348 million) for unpaid tax.
Regarding investment, Tanecu is expected to spend Sh186.473 million for payment of different taxes and covering transportation charges of cashew processing equipment that would be commissioned in a plant it was constructing and Sh100 million others for procurement of farms.
Also, Tanecu has allocated Sh421.450 million for procurement of permanent facilities including the construction of walls surrounding its warehouses located in Tandahimba District that would cost Sh139.450 million.
Furthermore, the document shows that Sh187 million would be used for buying a car, Sh15 million for rehabilitation of its Newala office and Sh8 million for purchasing board room chairs.
Contacted for comments, Tanecu accountant, Mr Rajabu Chambezi said the budget format had been taken from the regional cooperative leaders.
“They are the ones who instructs us to include the amount set for servicing debts in the budget of development activities. However, the debts will be serviced according to the unions’ collections,” he said.
But, the Newala Farmers Association (Nefa) chairman, Mr Muhidini Mnali said there are things that are not going well within the union with decisions being made without proper involvement of farmers.
“Farmers are not well informed about the debts, worse enough leaders of Agriculture Marketing Cooperative Societies (Amcos) attending these Tanecu meetings do not give us feedback,” he said over the phone.