Maravi

Farmers’ union seeks increased availability of funding

Farmers’ union seeks increased availability of funding
By Florence Bupe
Mon 28 Dec. 2009, 04:00 CAT

THE Zambia National Farmers Union (ZNFU) has urged the Bank of Zambia to engage commercial banks to ensure that funding is made more available for agricultural activities to save the sector from regressing.

In his end of year message, ZNFU president Jervis Zimba said although the agriculture sector had scored some successes, it had also faced a lot of challenges, some of which remain unresolved.

Zimba said the financial crisis that originated from the Western economies had negatively affected various sectors including Zambia’s agriculture industry through globalisation.

“We have seen many agricultural operations experiencing problems and struggling simply to survive the ‘financial tsunami’ which had its origins in economies that are geographically located far away, yet so close through globalisation,” Zimba said. “In this regard, we would like to appeal to the Central Bank to engage the commercial banks on this matter urgently to review the gravity of the circumstances before us.”

Zimba said the gravity of the difficulties that the agriculture sector faced could be reflected by the frequency of farm receiverships. He said against such a background, innovative interventions were required to ensure that production levels did not dwindle further.

“Against such a scenario, it is evident that innovative interventions are required urgently to save the levels of production in agriculture which had been progressing well for some sub- sectors but are now at risk. Acting jointly with the banks, appropriate interventions could be developed and the negative impact minimised,” he said.

Zimba specifically cited Kasama Coffee Company as one case that needed serious and urgent intervention to assist the entity to continue production.

“We are aware that critiques may say that liquidations are a product of private business decisions which should be resolved through appropriate private recourse action,” Zimba said.

“Our view on this one is that while this may be true, it is still necessary to take into consideration the repercussions of the hostile economic environment which prevailed during the year and not to forget that no one could have ever predicted the magnitude of the externally induced negative forces.”

Zimba said ZNFU made significant strides in responding to the numerous challenges extended by its members, with success in many areas.

He pointed out that the maize marketing exercise required the attention of the union. He explained that the government crop marketing exercise was successful partly due to the interventions effected by ZNFU.

“The agriculture sector was not spared as the impact of these developments was soon felt, especially for maize marketing as government had no resources to step in and participate in buying. Be that as it may, the union lobbied successfully and the funds were eventually secured to pay farmers and to step up the Food Reserve Agency (FRA) participation in the maize purchase exercise,” he said.

Zimba expressed hope that there would be a strengthened partnership between the private and public sectors in supporting agriculture sector activities.

Labels: GREAT DEPRESSION II, JERVIS ZIMBA, ZNFU

posted by MrK @ 3:46 AM