The Sunday Mail
Clemence Machadu Insight —
As we seek to expand Command Agriculture and increase our production volumes going forward, are we just looking at quantity over quality?
Howdy folks!
Events in Brazil over the past fortnight present key lessons that we ought to learn from as we brace for a bumper harvest in agriculture and as we seek to increase our exports so as to earn more foreign exchange to turnaround the economy.
The scandalous events relating to the handling of meat in that country, which were broken by the media on March 17, saw Brazil’s meat exports decline sharply from US$63 million that was being exported daily on average, before the scandal, to just US$74,000 as at March 21, as countries banned meat imports from the South American nation.
Musika wenyama wakadonha, literally!
About a week ago, Zimbabwe also joined many other nations that banned the importation of meat and related products from Brazil.
Other countries that have since lifted the ban have, however, increased inspections on Brazilian imports, which also increases costs.
Things will never be the same in Brazil.
Many local folks who are carnivores have chewed Brazilian meat at some point, wittingly or otherwise — be it at a restaurant, kumakwato or in the comforts of your own homes.
Or haven’t we?
Actually, meat and edible meat offal are Zimbabwe’s top six imports from Brazil.
The background of the whole scandal is that an investigation was launched on March 17 by Brazilian police into the suspected incidents whereby inspection agents were bribed into clearing the sale and export of meat which was unsuitable for consumption, something that is said to have been happening for years.
Investigators in the country alleged that they had evidence that 21 meat companies were involved in bribing government officials responsible for inspection to approve sales and exports of meat which was contaminated or spoiled. Reports actually say that, in some cases, the stench of rotten meat was concealed by smearing acid. And to think that we have probably eaten that kind of meat at some point is just upsetting.
I know some folks might want to ask why we have been exposed to the possibilities of gullibly eating rotten and contaminated meat from Brazil while we have a competent firm, Bureau Veritas, that has been contracted to verify the quality of our imports (with Food and Agriculture being one of the nine groups of products covered) — only to impose a ban based on other country’s decisions.
You will realise only a narrow range of our imports are monitored.
And, surprisingly, meat is not on the list. There are only four classes of products that are monitored under the Food and Agriculture group: biscuits, confectionery, beverages and fertilisers.
In total, just about 32 classes of products from different sectors are monitored by Bureau Veritas when Zimbabwe actually imports thousands of classes of products.
In light of this development, one expects to hear organisations that claim to represent and protect the rights of folks, such as Consumer Council of Zimbabwe and Buy Zimbabwe Campaign, making loud noises that meat should be included on the short list of products whose quality is monitored, given that about 60 percent of the beef that we eat locally is imported, with Brazil also being our key source market for beef as well as chicken and pork.
But that is not the moral of this story.
The gist of the matter is, as an agro-based economy, what lessons can we learn when it comes leveraging on quality to safeguard and promote our exports to the world?
As we have seen, a small issue involving a few people can actually affect the crumble of the economy.
While the investigations in Brazil were only targeting 21 meat producers in a country with thousands of meat producers, it affected the whole meat industry in that country and literally brought it to a screeching halt at some point. A little leaven leavened the entire lump.
That is why we ought to be very strict with our standards.
It begins with the quality of the products we are selling to each other as Zimbabweans.
This behaviour of tolerating the sale of meat in the streets is just absurd, meat that is ‘marinated’ by live flies — magreen bomber.
That’s how it all starts and quality ceases to be a priority.
You see folks, different countries have issued out sanitary and phyto-sanitary (SPS) measures dealing with food safety and animal and plant health in trade under the World Trade Organisation.
And there are more than 10,000 SPS measures that they have implemented on food safety and animal and plant health by different countries.
These mainly aim to foster that people are being supplied with food that is safe to eat by ensuring diseases such influenza, foot and mouth, pests, fruit flies, and other plant diseases are not spread in food.
As we seek to expand Command Agriculture and increase our production volumes going forward, are we just looking at quantity over quality?
What really is our plan?
If we don’t readily have such answers, we might find ourselves stuck with products with no market.
Improving on our quality has the advantage of opening access to wider and more profitable markets.
A good example is the Economic Partnership Agreement that we have signed with the European Union to export our products duty free and quota free to markets in Europe.
However, most of our food and agriculture products do not meet the quality that is required there.
You see, in order to access the EU market, exporters must conform to that region’s technical and safety standards.
We must, therefore, put more emphasis on meeting the high quality standards.
While our economy is highly becoming informal, with about 95 percent of workers said to be employed in the informal sector, most of the goods that are produced there are not monitored and there is no apparent criteria that is followed — mazvake mazvake.
The guy who catches fish from a sewage dam in Ruwa is allowed to sell them in broad daylight in First Street.
So is the woman who has scavenged apples from a heap of rotting garbage in Mbare.
And the same goes for another who has hunted rats in some graveyard in Mbudzi and is also allowed access to the market. Then we expect agricultural exports to grow?
Let’s take a leaf from crocodile producers such as Padenga Holdings, who are actually exporting croc meat to markets with high quality requirements such as Europe and other continents, because they have placed high standards at the heart of all their activities.
It is also important to ensure corruption is decisively dealt with, be it in the granting of permits or certification of products by our officials.
Look at how corruption lately affected Brazil’s economy in general and the meat industry in particular.
Given that Brazil contributes 20 percent to global meat exports, it means that the ban of meat imports from Brazil by many countries left the South American country stuck with tonnes and tonnes of meat.
Some of it probably had to be destroyed. Now their recovery cycles have also been frustrated and it will take time to return the country’s meat industry to its normal position.
The gospel of high quality and high standards, to complement competitiveness, should cease being treated as heresy in Zimbabwe.
Later folks!
