Since the early years following independence, agriculture has been at the center of the Tanzanian government’s development policies and poverty reduction strategies. The new African political class was in fact called upon to solve fundamental issues of social injustice and widespread poverty, particularly in rural areas. One of the legacies of colonialism was the coexistence of capitalist agriculture — practiced by European companies, settlers and a minority of African farmers— with family farming practiced by most of the rural population (Iliffe 1979). Colonial policies had created a “racial tripartition” between the European minority that controlled agricultural enterprises, exports, banking and industry, the Asian population that controlled internal trade, and the African population that was assigned the task of providing the labour force for capitalist agriculture or producing cheap food for urban or international markets.