Paddy Zhanda
Oliver Kazunga Senior Business Reporter
THE government will set up a central breeding station to improve livestock production in the country. Responding to questions during the inaugural Zim-Asset Bulawayo stakeholder conference last Friday, Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development Deputy Minister responsible for livestock, Paddy Zhanda, said seven other livestock breeding stations would be established in different provinces.
“What we’ve in mind as far as planning is concerned is that we want to establish breeding stations, one central and then we also establish seven of them in each province like what they do in Botswana,” he said. “They (Botswana) have one central breeding station where they take semen from different breeds and as a result semen becomes affordable.”
Zhanda expressed optimism that the livestock breeding programme would go a long way in changing the face of livestock production in the country over the next five years.
At present, Zimbabwe’s national herd stands at five million cattle. Earlier in his address to the delegates, Zhanda said the country also needs to enhance food security by improving grain production.
He said the government had pegged the maize producer price at $390 per tonne and this is “highly” subsidised to boost grain production.
“The price of maize at $390 per tonne is a highly subsidised price meant to encourage farmers to respond to that positive price and I’m afraid that farmers have failed to respond to that initiative,” said Zhanda.
He dismissed the assertion that fertilizer in Zimbabwe was expensive compared to other countries in the region. “What we’re failing to do is very simple, we’re not achieving the yields and agriculture is about yields in terms of viability.
“In Malawi, farmers are producing an average of two tonnes and there are no tractors and equipment, Malawian farmers use hands to produce,” said Zhanda, adding that Zimbabweans should desist from being cry babies and waiting for everything to be done by the government.
He also challenged members of the Grain Millers’ Association of Zimbabwe to venture into grain production to boost output in the agriculture sector.
Zhanda also dismissed the notion that the country is facing food shortages over the years because of the Land Reform Programme. Zimbabwe embarked on a Land Reform Programme in 2000 to ensure that there was equitable distribution of land in the country.
“We’ve failed to feed ourselves. We’re not hungry because of the land issue. The land issue, we all know very well, was meant to address the land ownership imbalance,” Zhanda said.
He said the highest production in Zimbabwe’s agriculture sector occurred in 1995/6 when the country produced 2,6 million tonnes of maize with 1,6 million tonnes coming from communal farmers.