Govt won't allow importation of mealie meal - Mutati

Govt won't allow importation of mealie meal - Mutati
Written by Kabanda Chulu
Tuesday, April 28, 2009 3:56:57 PM

GOVERNMENT will not allow the importation of mealie meal into the country, claiming that prices will stabilize soon due to the harvest of early maize crops.

Last week, the Zambia Competition Commission suggested that government should allow the importation of mealie meal to help reduce prices since the Millers Association of Zambia (MAZ) were operating like a cartel, hence exploiting consumers through excessive pricing of mealie meal.

But commerce minister Felix Mutati has said the importation of maize through the Food Reserve Agency (FRA) was enough to cater for the deficit.

He said government also wanted to utilize the existing local capacity of millers, who were creating jobs and making money to re-invest in the country.

"It will not make sense to import mealie meal especially that there is brand loyalty, for instance, others just eat mealie meal from Choma Milling but if we import, we may create apprehension and people will resist since there will only be stocks of 'xyz' brands," said Mutati.

"Also when we import mealie meal, people will lose jobs and there will be need to import by-products like stock feeds, so where are we going to end? An importer of finished products and yet we have the capacity but soon there will be some early maize harvest and by next month many other farmers will come on board to correct the situation."

Despite the importation of thousands of metric tonnes of maize by the FRA, which they later subsidized to members of MAZ, mealie meal prices in the country are still high with a 25 kilogramme bag of breakfast costing at an average of K70,000.

This development prompted the Competition Commission to ask government to allow imports so that prices could come down in order to protect Zambian consumers and to afford buyers a wider choice for the products.