2009 Harvest

Zambia has enjoyed good harvests in the last few years because we planned our farming seasons and had some good rains.

The Food Reserve Agency and the Ministry of Agriculture worked as a team to ensure that farming inputs were made available to both the commercial farmer and the widely dispersed peasant farmer. A similar effort was made for collection of produce and subsequent storage as reserve to provide food throughout the year.

Food production, like rain, is a vey delicate business. Planning, forecasting, and preparation are significant keys to success. There are many storage warehouses across the country for grain storage to cater for a bumper harvest at the end of the rainy season. More and more intermediaries are cropping up in the food production chain such that various crop buying agencies are vibrantly engaged in trading in Maize, Wheat, Soya Bean and several other crops. Millers have much larger storage sheds now because milling is a round-the-clock business to supply the Zambian consumer as well as consumers in the region. Packaging producers and importers are doing a roaring business supplying jute bags, thread, and weigh scales to the sector.

The grain business is definitely a winning business as the price of Mealie Meal continues to go up every couple of months. In the middle of 2007 Roller Meal retailed at K25,000 per 25Kg bag. Today this basic food necessity for many Zambians is selling at K35,000 per 25Kg bag. This marks a whopping increase of 40% in one year! The population is growing, people must eat, and Mealie Meal is the stuff that satisfies our stomachs.

The current prices of fertilizer spell doom for next year’s grain harvest.

Every farmer in the country whether peasant producer or commercial farmer is lamenting at the high cost of fertilizer. Commercial farmers recognize that they must procure this commodity at whatever cost or go bust, but peasant farmers who constitute the bulk of the grain producers will sow their seeds when the rain comes and will fail to afford the vital fertilizer that is needed to guarantee a good harvest. The writing is on the wall. Next year promises to put food shortages top on the national development agenda unless this dilemma is addressed immediately.

Too often we respond too late to avert a crisis and the price to pay is very high. We end up having to beg for ‘food aid’ from the ‘donor’ community in turn will attach lots of conditions to the aid program and compromise our own national development programs. In addition, when this ‘food aid’ arrives in the country it will further damage the already weakened farming sector as grain prices will be controlled by Government through the ‘price fixing’ of the ‘food aid’. This kind of knock to the agriculture sector will take several years to repair and this too, only if good rains persist for a couple of years thereafter.

Nitrogen Chemicals of Zambia is a strategic industry that is being left to go to grass. We do not seem to have a decent forward looking program for the company that will ensure that NCZ plays its rightful role in supplying fertilizer to the farming community across the country. Initial plans for NCZ were that it would produce not only enough fertilizer to support Zambia’s agriculture sector, but even more for export to the region.

Since the time that NCZ was slated for privatization, the company has limped along incurring debt to its employees and has been relegated to being a burden to the tax payer.

NCZ has substantial infrastructure that is useable and offers any investor an opportunity to develop the company into the largest producer of fertilizer amongst Zambia’s eight neighbors.

The Zambia Development Agency in collaboration with Government and private sector business associations must work tirelessly towards getting NCZ back on its feet as a major producer of fertilizer in Zambia at prices that will guarantee food security for Zambia.

Effort must be made at all levels. Local Private Businesses must be attracted to invest in NCZ to ensure viability and a sustainable operation. Foreign State Enterprises must be targeted too, as an alternative model for resuscitating this all too important industry. Our international marketing programs must be stepped up to bring in new and fresh capital and business ideas respectively.

The world economies and their economics are all about food. Conflict and suffering all over the world have been primarily triggered due to lack of access to food. For many countries the reasons given for mass suffering are justifiable when productive life is disrupted by Tsunamis, Monsoon rains, Cyclones, Volcanic eruptions, Earthquakes and so on. What will Zambia’s reasons be? Lack of foresight? No planning? Insufficient investment? Lack of focus? These are all very limp excuses that will not attract pity but will instead label us as incompetent thus invoking those dreaded conditions by ‘donors’ that offer a helping hand. If Zambia can start to seriously put food on the top of the social and economic development agenda then we will be on the right track to a brighter future and sustained peace and prosperity.

Published 8 July 2008