Take silos to the people, Govt urged

Cde Machaya

Munyaradzi Musiiwa Midlands Correspondent
Government has been urged to set up silos in each province to ease the burden of transportation and mass storage of grain by the Grain Marketing Board (GMB).This comes in the wake of a projected bumper harvest due to Command Agriculture programme, the Presidential Inputs Support Scheme and good rains this season.

Midlands Minister of State for Provincial Affairs Jason Machaya said in an interview yesterday that farmers under the Command Agriculture programme and the Presidential Input Support Scheme had surpassed the projected yield.

Minister Machaya said GMB had set up 441 collection points in the province to enable easy purchasing and transportation of grain.

“We are urging Government to set up silos for each and every province because these agricultural programmes such as Command Agriculture have proved that we can have better yields in future,” he said.

“This will ease the burden on GMB because the transportation costs are reduced and storage would have been localised. This will also make it easy for the redistribution of grain to areas that would be in need of food aid.”

Minister Machaya said there were 5 000 people in need of food aid in the province after their crops were either washed away or submerged by mud when Cyclone Dineo ripped through the country early this year.

“We have more than 5 000 people who are in need of food aid regardless of the bumper harvest that we are expecting this harvesting period,” he said.

“These include those families whose homes and fields and crop were destroyed by the incessant rains and the floods that affected the province, particularly in Gokwe and Mberengwa.

“More than 300 families in Gokwe were left homeless by the floods and their fields were submerged, while some had their crops destroyed. These are in need of food aid.”

Minister Machaya said the rural districts councils in the province were in the process of servicing roads after receiving graders and caterpillars from Zimbabwe National Roads Administration (Zinara) to increase accessibility of some areas to enable farmers to deliver their grain at collection points that were convenient to them.