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(SUNDAY MAIL ZW) Crops, livestock to be subsidised

Crops, livestock to be subsidised
Sunday, 01 July 2012 00:51
Sunday Mail Reporter

The Government is planning to introduce subsidies on all crops and livestock, the Minister of Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development, Dr Joseph Made, has disclosed.

He said the move, to be contained in the new Agriculture Policy Document set to be tabled before Cabinet this month, is aimed at ensuring that farmers stay in business.
“In light of the cotton price impasse, we have decided to subsidise all crops and livestock to help farmers.

“Farmers are being pushed out of business by unreasonable high costs of inputs, hence Government has to intervene,” he said, adding subsidies on potato inputs were already in place.

Zimbabwe Commercial Farmers’ Union director Mr Shadreck Tsimba welcomed the proposed move.

“This is a good move which we expect to broaden the food security base. Government has for long been assisting in wheat and maize production only while growers of other crops had to struggle on their own. As a union, we have been trying to assist farmers in the production of other crops and livestock, but at a small scale,” he said.

Mr Tsimba urged the Government to also consider assisting farmers with the marketing of crops.

“Government should consider introducing markets for crops like potatoes since they are not easy to store in large quantities,” he said.

Labels: FARM SUBSIDIES, JOSEPH MADE

posted by MrK @ 5:20 PM