Irrigation pumps lead the way, exceeding targets by 58 percentFour years after exempting hundreds of agricultural imports and technologies from taxes and duties, Ethiopia has seen a surge in farm machinery use, a new government data reveals. The decision removed import taxes and tariffs on about 600 types of farm inputs as well as machineries including tractors, combine harvesters, pumps and their accessories. - Advertisement -Presenting the first three years’ performance of the country’s 10-year development plan, Planning and Development Minister Fitsum Assefa (PhD) said import of three key farm machinery categories have grown significantly. Tractor tallies in the country were 5,962 four years ago but have risen to 34,630 currently, according to Fitsum. Over the past two harvest seasons of last year, a total of 639 million quintals of crops were yielded, exceeding the previous year’s harvest by 37 million quintals and exceeding projections for the current year by 12 million quintals.

Source: Ethiopian News September 02, 2023 19:21 UTC