Millicent Mtombeni
Herald Reporter
Milk suppliers are struggling to meet demand, with some retailers already rationing the product, prompting the Confederation of Zimbabwe Retailers (CZR) to call for a united front to address the challenges.

CZR president Mr Denford Mutashu said it was important to work on aggressively boosting the national herd and to offer direct support to dairy farmers.

“We are very worried and concerned as a sector by the inability of our suppliers to meet the demand of the customers nationwide.

“This shortage of milk has been persisting for some time now,” he said in an interview on Tuesday.

Some retailers are restricting customers to six 1 litre bottles, to minimise hoarding.

Mr Mutashu said it has become a trend that the market experiences milk shortages during winter.

“The dairy industry indicated that the challenges also came as a result of their source countries facing some challenges such as South Africa, which has its own issues within its border,” he said.

Zimbabwe imports 48 percent of its milk requirements, a situation he said was unhealthy for a country that has conducive climatic conditions for dairy farming.

“Since the promulgation of the Statutory Instrument 64 in 2016 (which took effect from July 1), we should have been in a position to be self-sufficient in products like milk and the other key basic commodities,” he said.

Mr Mutashu called on the Government to compliment dairy farmers through necessary support.

“We need to reinvest through direct support to communal, commercial and A1 farmers to ensure that we give them some support to augment their herd,” said Mr Mutashu.

“It is about increasing the national herd that is very key, and increasing the milk cows in the country even if it means importing from neighbouring countries like Botswana; at this juncture it is very important.”

There are calls for Zimbabwe to be self-sufficient and to reactivate all productive sectors, including mining and manufacturing and not rely on other countries for basic commodities. Alongside the fight against Covid-19, Mr Mutashu said, there was need to ensure citizens are well fed and have easy access to basic commodities at affordable prices.

Recently, the Zimbabwe Association of Dairy Farmers (ZADF) expressed concern over the high cost of supplementary feed, saying it was weighing the industry down.

ZADF said smallholder dairy farmers needed to be equipped with information and knowledge that could help make their production systems more competitive.