Farmers deliver 14k tonnes of maize to GMB
Minister Joseph Made
Oliver Kazunga Senior Business Reporter
AGRICULTURE, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development Minister Joseph Made says farmers have since the beginning of this year’s harvest season delivered 14,000 tonnes of maize to the Grain Marketing Board.
Minister Made said this while responding to a question from the floor in Parliament on Wednesday on what the government was doing to support rural families that have been unable to get adequate harvests due to the poor 2014/15 farming season.
“To date, farmers in this difficult season have already started delivering grain and we’re very grateful for this.
“The intake so far is already at 14,000 tonnes from those farmers who have delivered.
“I’m very happy to indicate that the government itself is sourcing maize from outside and soon the first consignment will be arriving in Bulawayo depots. Then there’s also the private sector,” he said, adding that Cabinet had agreed that the private sector should continue to import grain into the country.
At present, the GMB has 118,000 tonnes of maize in its Strategic Grain Reserve (SGR) against the 500,000 tonnes that the SGR should hold at any given time.
The SGR is meant to ensure national food security and grain is distributed to areas of deficit in times of need.
Of late, farmers have been reluctant to deliver their maize to the GMB owing to late payments.
Due to limited fiscal space by Treasury, the GMB has been underfunded, a situation that has seen the marketing board not being able to pay farmers on time.
It has been reported that GMB owes farmers $49 million for grain delivered during the 2013-14 marketing season.
As a result, despite the GMB buying the maize at a high price of $390 per tonne compared to millers who are buying at $180 per tonne, a number of farmers are selling the grain to private buyers out of desperation.
Zimbabwe requires at least 1.8 million tonnes of maize annually and has over the years relied on imports from neighbouring countries such as Zambia and South Africa, to cover the deficit.