Farmers have in recent months been complaining that their work was being hampered by lack of money occasioned by the failure of the Grain Marketing Board to pay them for delivered produce.
Many actually failed to plant wheat in winter this year, and ran the risk of failing to return to the field for the summer season as the GMB had no money to pay them for the maize and wheat they had delivered, not just this year, but also in 2014.
Indeed, farming being a business that needs money to finance, the failure by the GMB to pay farmers for their produce, severely constrained their capacity to buy inputs, prepare their land, plant and finance other farm operations. Not only that, farmers struggled to make ends meet as revenue from their fields finances many other obligations like paying school fees for their children, buying food and so on. Thus, the failure by the GMB to pay them greatly affected the rural economy.
But the government has always assured them that money would be made available to the GMB to pay farmers. Given the challenging economic environment and that many farmers were owed tens of thousands for grain delivered before this season, some were not convinced.
However, the government has just announced that the $14,5 million that the GMB needed to clear all outstanding payments to farmers has been provided.
Charles Chikaura, the GMB chairman said on Tuesday that of the $14,5 million, $11 million has been deposited into farmers’ bank accounts while $3,5 was sent to the depots at which farmers delivered their produce.
He said:
“A receipt from Treasury was issued to GMB on November 5 to clear all outstanding farmer payments for the 2014 and 2015 grain marketing season, as well as commence part payments for grain delivered in 2015-2016. As at today’s date, GMB depots countrywide are holding a total of $480,158,03 in uncollected farmer cash payments from previous disbursements dating back to August 2015. It is evident that some farmers without bank accounts are not collecting their payments at depots where they delivered their grain.”
Farmers must be delighted that they are now being paid for their labour. It is pleasing that the money has been availed in reasonably good time, enabling farmers to withdraw it and start running around to buy inputs so that when the first rains fall in the next few weeks, they would be ready to plant.
We appreciate that the disbursements might, for some farmers in certain regions, be a bit late to some extent because agriculture is not only about buying seed today and planting tomorrow, but also about preparing the land, buying implements and the like in good time. Farmers who were waiting for the GMB to pay for them to be able to do these may be unable to adequately accomplish these tasks at this stage. That would be regrettable. However, many of our farmers are always resourceful, so the impact of the late disbursement should be minimised. At the same time, we say it is better for them to be capacitated late than not at all.
The Southern Africa Regional Climate Outlook Forum (SARCOF) recently predicted that there will be normal to below normal rains in much of the Sadc region. In its national forecast, the Meteorological Services Department has projected that much of the country would receive normal to below normal rainfall.
Areas in agro-ecological Region One which are Harare, Mashonaland East, Mashonaland West, Mashonaland Central, north-eastern parts of Midlands and Manicaland provinces are likely to receive below normal rains between October and December.
However, between January and March 2016 normal to above normal rains are expected in that region, the country’s best crop farming zone.
During the same period agro-ecological Regions Two and Three which encompass Matabeleland North, northwest Matabeleland South, Bulawayo, Masvingo, extreme parts of Manicaland, and the southern parts of the Midlands province, are likely to experience drought. The situation would be no different in Regions Four and Five.
The national prognosis is not too encouraging. This makes it very critical for farmers to do what they can do to prepare to work the land and wait for the rains, which they have no control over, to fall at their time. This is where the payments from the GMB are appreciated.
We reiterate that our farmers, given the general dryness and progressively declining rainfall totals in recent years amid climate change, should spread their risk by, inter-alia, growing hardier crops, spread their planting across the wet season and choose shorter season varieties. In most cases, a risk-averse farmer is more successful than one who has no risk anticipation and management plans.
In addition, more resources must be invested in developing farmers’ irrigation capacity for the industry to rely less on rain-fed production.