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Uganda Consumer Goods
In 1989 the government estimated that the nation's four
textile mills manufactured about 8 million meters of
cotton cloth
per year, but Uganda's growing population required at
least ten
times this amount to attain self-sufficiency. The
government
began rehabilitating three other mills for weaving and
spinning
operations, and the United Garment Industries commissioned
a
plant to manufacture knitted apparel, some of it for
export,
under a US$3 million rehabilitation loan.
The production of beverages, including alcoholic
beverages
and soft drinks, increased in the late 1980s, and
officials
believed Uganda could achieve self-sufficiency in this
area in
the 1990s. In 1987 three breweries increased their
production by
an average of 100 percent, to more than 16 million liters.
In the
same year, five soft drink producers increased output by
15
percent to nearly 6 million liters. In addition, Lake
Victoria
Bottling Company, producers of Pepsi Cola, completed
construction
of a new plant at Nakawa.
Sugar production was vital to the soft drink industry,
so
rehabilitating the sugar industry promised to assist in
attaining
self-sufficiency in beverage production
(see Crops
, this
ch.).
The government hoped to reduce sugar imports from Cuba as
the
Lugazi and Kakira estates resumed production in 1989 and
1990. In
1988 and 1989, Uganda's dairy industry relied on imports
of dried
milk powder and butter to produce milk for sale to the
general
public. Processed milk, produced under monopoly by the
government-owned Uganda Dairy Corporation, registered an
increase
of 29.5 percent, from 13 million liters in 1986 to 16.9
million
liters in 1987. To improve the local dairy industry, the
government rehabilitated milk cooling and collection
centers,
milk processing plants, and the industry's vehicles. And
in the
late 1980s, the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Husbandry,
and
Fisheries imported 1,500 in-calf freisian heifers to form
the
nucleus of a restocking effort on private and government
farms
(see Livestock
, this ch.).
Production of wheat and corn flour increased in 1987,
1988,
and 1989, despite continuing low-capacity utilization in
the
industry. Only one establishment, the Uganda Millers,
which
worked at just over 20 percent of capacity, produced wheat
flour.
The company nonetheless increased production to 9.5
thousand tons
in 1987, 32 percent more than the previous year. At the
same
time, corn production increased 87.3 percent in 1987, to
4.6
thousand tons.
In 1988 only one cigarette-manufacturing plant, the
British
American Tobacco Company, operated in Uganda. Its
production
increased slightly between 1986 and 1987 to 1,434.8
million
cigarettes. In 1988 the government provided a loan of
US$1.43
million to rehabilitate the company's tobacco redrying
plant in
Kampala.
In November 1988, President Museveni opened an edible
oil
mill at Tororo to process cotton, sunflowers, peanuts, and
sesame
seeds. The plant had the capacity to process fifteen tons
of raw
oil daily into 4.3 tons of refined cooking oil and to
produce an
estimated 300 tons of soap annually as a by-product. The
mill was
built under a barter deal with Schwermaschinen Kombinat
Ernst
Thaelmann of the German Democratic Republic (East
Germany), which
received coffee and cotton in exchange. In its first year
of
production, the plant encountered operating difficulties,
but its
officers still expected Uganda to achieve self-sufficiency
in
edible oil manufacturing during the 1990s. Mukwano
Industries,
Uganda's largest soap-manufacturing company, doubled
production
in 1988 and 1989.
The Uganda Leather and Tanning Industry was the
nation's only
leather producer, operating at less than 5 percent of
capacity in
1987, when output dropped by nearly 40 percent from the
previous
year. Although three footwear producers were in operation,
the
Uganda Bata Shoe Company produced 98 percent of the
nation's
shoes, and it increased production in 1988 and 1989.
Data as of December 1990
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