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Reports that villagers in Binga are selling fertilizer given to them under the Presidential Input Scheme to buyers in neighbouring Zambia made sad reading.
A visit to the district by Chronicle last week established that some villagers in Binga were diverting the inputs to Zambia.
The villagers were reportedly selling a 50kg bag of both ammonium nitrate and Compound D fertilisers at between $15 and $16. Binga district administrator Mrs Lydia Banda-Ndethi confirmed that the villagers were selling the inputs to Zambians.
The move by the villagers shows a lack of appreciation of the efforts by President Mugabe to help Zimbabweans become self-sufficient, in terms of food security, at household level and boost national food production. The President, a renowned farmer himself, realises that one of the ways to beat hunger is to help farmers grow food.
But it seems some sections of the Zimbabwean society have become used to rely on donors and cannot work to produce food for themselves. That is the only explanation because there is no other reason for a person to sell inputs given to them for free to help them grow food for their own consumption. Binga is a drought- prone district and most villagers cannot afford to buy farming inputs resulting in the President and Government chipping in to come to their aid. In fact President Mugabe’s Input Scheme is a nationwide programme meant to complement numerous other schemes drawn up to boost food production.
Mrs Banda-Ndethi said Binga district had so far received 90 tonnes of fertiliser under the Presidential Input Scheme and the inputs were already being distributed in the wards in the area.
There is no empowerment that surpasses being capacitated to produce food on your own. All what the Binga villagers need is to go to their fields and till the land. The food is not even for the State but for their consumption. Fine, those who have the capacity to produce more can make some income from selling their surplus crops.
We urge the Government, traditional leaders and the police to get to the bottom of the matter and deal with the shameless villagers.
We applaud Chief Charles Saka, who also expressed concern over the practice by the villagers, for undertaking to work with the police to identify the culprits.
“We are really worried about the people who illegally sell fertiliser to Zambian farmers. Those involved in those dealings should be punished by the law and it is the responsibility of everyone in the community to assist police in identifying the culprits. We do not condone such practice and it has to be stopped forthwith,” said Chief Saka. Perhaps it is a good idea for those lazy villagers who do not want to farm to indicate to the distributors of the inputs that they do not want to work in the fields so that the inputs are given to those who are willing to produce food.
The Binga villagers’ action flies in the face of Government and other stakeholders’ efforts to boost agricultural production in the country. Recently the Government and the private sector poured in nearly US$1 billion into funding agriculture for the forthcoming farming season. Zimbabwe is agriculture-based and good harvests by farmers mean a boom for the economy.
Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa announced recently that Government would support farmers to the tune of US$161 million. The US$161 million will be Government’s input support scheme for farmers. This is over and above the US$720 million that banks have mobilised for on-lending to farmers. The Bankers’ Association of Zimbabwe has sourced US$620 million while one of the country’s biggest banks CBZ mobilised US$100 million on its own.
Online Reporter