The Sunday Mail
Peter Gambara
The forecast for the 2019/2020 summer cropping season is for a normal to below-normal rainfall season.
Weather experts divide the season into three, three-month periods.
For the first three months — October to December — the whole country is forecast to receive normal to above-normal rains.
In the next three-month period (November to January), the country is again forecast to receive normal to above-normal rains.
During the third period, which runs from December to February, the northern parts of the country — for example, the three Mashonaland provinces, Manicaland and Midlands — are expected to receive normal to above-normal rains, whilst a small belt in the southern region of Masvingo is projected to receive normal to below-normal rains.
Also, in the January to March period, the whole country is forecast to have normal to below-normal rains.
However, as explained above, the “normal to below-normal” bit is only expected at the tail end of the season.
Planting early
Given the weather forecast, it is prudent for Government to ensure that farmers would be able to plant early.
The major challenge farmers face today is the fact that they now require huge amounts of money to produce.
It costs approximately US$900 to US$1 000 to grow a hectare of maize and at today’s interbank exchange rates, this translates to approximately $15 000 per hectare.
Similarly, this translates $300 000 for 20 hectares and a massive $750 000 for 50 hectares.
However, bear in mind that input suppliers do not use the interbank rate to price their products; therefore, they are likely to be using the exchange rate way above the interbank rate, hence, the cost of growing a hectare will be at least $20 000, and a massive $1 million would be needed for just 50 hectares.
There are very few farmers out there who can fork out that kind of money from their pockets/bank accounts.
Government should, therefore, bail out farmers by making the finance available to them on a loan basis.
A Government finance scheme like Command Agriculture has received a lot of criticism lately ostensibly because a lot of farmers were defaulting.
Also, there were allegations of lack of transparency in the distribution of inputs.
Government has, therefore, since engaged some banks to administer an agricultural financing scheme on its behalf.
If farmers were to approach banks on their own, banks would do their normal due diligence and charge prevailing interest rates and demand collateral.
These are obviously not affordable at the moment, hence the PPP (public-private partnership) arrangement among Government, banks and private input suppliers will see farmers being charged just 10 percent per annum on loans.
Having said that, the only challenge we face is that the new financing arrangements were announced late and the agreed process is likely to take long, especially at a time the rainy season is imminent.
Therefore, there is need for Government to sit down with farmer unions/ representatives, Agritex and banks, and agree on ways to shorten the process so that farmers can get inputs and plant early.
We stand to benefit as a country if farmers were to plant early.
Merit
Whilst Government is emphasising the need to finance farmers with irrigation facilities, I feel this is a misplaced emphasis.
Government should simply identify capable farmers who have a history of delivering to GMB and finance them.
Agritex officials on the ground know the good farmers.
With the current electricity challenges, irrigating crops is likely to have its challenges.
Actually, some farmers who grew wheat this past winter season failed to irrigate their crops to maturity and some ended up just ploughing it under as green manure.
Electricity was available for barely five hours, including on farms, yet that is not even sufficient to irrigate one portion if a farmer is using portable pipes.
In a normal situation, a farmer moves the pipes three to four times a day, so five hours of electricity is not really beneficial to farmers.
We are better off engaging capable farmers and timeously providing them with inputs.
Also, we should always try to learn from history, and history tells us that the first year that Command Agriculture was launched, Government provided the “good” farmers with inputs very early, and the country witnessed a bumper harvest.
It is commendable that Government has taken the decision to continue funding the production of critical crops like maize and soya beans through a PPP arrangement with banks and the private sector.
However, it should also ensure long-term sustainability by making sure that the inputs have been directed to the right farmers, the inputs are available on time, farmers plant on time and that the farmers receive adequate support to see the crops through to harvest.
Co-operation
Whilst the decision to channel funds through banks was a good idea, more could be achieved if Government worked with farmers’ associations, Agritex and private sector input suppliers.
How? Firstly, Government should provide enough support to Agritex, the extension arm of Government.
Currently, agricultural extension officers/workers literally stay at their stations since they do not have the means to visit farmers.
These officers should be able to regularly visit farmers and give advice on pests and disease control, weed management et cetera.
They can also compliment banks in monitoring the performance of contracted farmers on the ground.
I doubt that CBZ and Agribank will have enough manpower to monitor farmers on the ground; therefore, the extension officers could be useful, provided they have been given resources.
Secondly, whilst at the time of assessment a farmer looks capable, breakdowns happen in farming, and once a tractor, for example, breaks down in the middle of land preparation or planting, it takes time for a farmer to fix the problem.
This is more so in the current economic environment, where prices have sky-rocketed.
Farmers normally receive support from other nearby farmers; therefore, it is best that Government, through the extension officers, encourages farmers to form farmers’ associations.
The reality on the ground sometimes is that two neighbouring farmers hardly know each other and cannot assist each other.
The white former commercial farmers had very strong farmers’ associations.
The same should happen with our current ones.
If they support each other, farming operations are likely to be done on time.
Thirdly, input suppliers are normally very happy to provide training to farmers on the use of their products.
We continue to get low yields because some farmers will have failed to properly control weeds or pests like armyworm.
There are private companies out there who, given the opportunity, will provide free training to farmers on the use of herbicides, pesticides et cetera.
Farmers have not yet grasped control measures on pests like the notorious fall armyworm.
Worse still, Government has not provided the necessary funding to train extension officers so that they can adequately provide the same training to farmers.
Therefore, as a short-term measure, Government should invite input suppliers it engaged in the PPP arrangement to come forward and provide free training to farmers on the use of their products.
They just need to be invited to do so by Government agencies.
Last season, the country harvested about 750 000 metric tonnes and now we have to import maize from countries like Tanzania.
We are, therefore, starting from a deficit/negative position.
What we need now is to have as many good farmers as possible to be provided with inputs so that they can plant early, so that we realise a sizeable maize crop as a nation and place hope on the weather forecast, which is predicting a normal- to below-normal season.
It is also not enough for Government to say they have provided funding through banks.
Measures should be put in place to expedite the provision of inputs to the contracted farmers so that they can plant early.
Government should also provide support to its departments so that the officers not only provide agricultural extension support, but also assist in monitoring and organising training to farmers.
Peter Gambara is an agricultural economist and consultant currently based in Pretoria
