Charles Ssebyala, former Luweero Town Council chairman, has retired from politics to the farm. Since then, he has tripled his visits to the family coffee farm in the wake of booming coffee sales. Their coffee plantation, measuring 14 acres, is the pride of the family after the recent bumper harvest of over 80 bags.

The fair prices prevailing in the market for the harvest are inspiring new family income projects. Ssebyala has already bought more land, furnished his house and hopes to build a hotel on land he acquired at Wobulenzi Town Hall in Luweero District.

“When you make good money through hard-earned work, the excitement that comes with that good money requires planning. I have already invested the money in tangible projects to increase family income.

Farmers should be able to own good houses and pay school fees for their children. This is what I have done, among other projects,” he says.

As president of the Luweero Town Council in 2013, Ssebyala was already involved in the coffee growing project, but only on a four-acre piece of land.

Political pressure and meager earnings from his political office were eating into the family’s income from rental homes and a medical clinic run by his wife. But with the advice of friends, religious leaders and the Buganda Kingdom who set the ‘Mwanyi terimba’ or coffee is a safe business programme, Ssebyala set out to expand his coffee acreage to at least 10 acres.

Ssebyala says keeping up with coffee market trends, disease control and planting disease-resistant varieties are the keys to sustaining coffee plantations. “We didn’t have much land to expand the coffee project. The first inaugural harvest was about 15 bags of coffee in 2017. At that time, the

The land dedicated to coffee was only six acres,” he says.

Ssebyala says that in Uganda, farmers have long been relegated to the unemployed class, earning only to meet their domestic needs for food and clothing, but farmers have the ability to eclipse the white-collar working class of citizens. “I have always told my fellow farmers that we are not unemployed, but we are equally employed in our orchards. We, as farmers, must show the world that we are not unemployed and that we have the ability to survive thanks to the garden. The coffee harvest will help us educate our children, build modest houses and live a dignified life,” he says.

Ssebyala had worked in agriculture for about 30 years and had tried many other crops, such as corn, beans and bananas, both for food and to earn money. But his discovery of coffee cultivation was a surprise.

“Coffee cultivation is reopening closed doors. I had assumed that politics was the way to shape my future, but God had a different direction. I didn’t make it to Parliament and I don’t regret choosing the garden. The political position gave me social capital and the garden is my new position,” he says.

Ssebyala dreamed of representing Katikamu North constituency in the 11th Parliament but never gave up his coffee dream, from which he earned cash to meet the demands of his voters.

But Ssebyala is happy that many farmers have realized the value of growing coffee. “The more coffee farmers there are in an area, the safer our coffee farms will be because we have people stealing fresh coffee beans from the orchards,” he says.

Ssebyala also accepted the idea of ​​introducing organic manure generated in the new poultry project run by his family. “The poultry farm with about 300 birds is still small, but we hope to triple the number of birds. The excrement from the poultry farm will be transferred to the coffee plantation,” he says.

The hope of acquiring an irrigation pump for the coffee farm is not lost, due to the good price of coffee, Ssebyala is also thinking of introducing an irrigation water pump to maintain the health of the coffee trees during the dry seasons. Part of the land has excellent soils prone to great water loss during drought, he adds.

Ssebyala is happy that many farmers have realized the value of coffee and are busy planting the crop. The more coffee growers there are in an area, the safer our coffee farms become because we have people still growing fresh coffee beans in the orchards, he says.

The sections of land where Ssebyala’s coffee plantation is located require manure and he has now introduced organic manure generated by the new poultry project run by his family.

Ssebyala is also thinking of introducing an irrigation water pump to maintain the health of the coffee trees during the dry season. One section of the land has sandy soils that are prone to large water loss during drought.