Online Reporter
GROWING enough food to feed ourselves rather than relying on imports means we need to store crops harvested over a few weeks for at least a year, and these days perhaps for a year or two as we cope with far more variable weather in these days of rapid climate change.
The storage capacity varies.
We have some modern silo complexes and private sector millers are able to store some more in modern conditions, although usually only a month or two at a time.
But too much of our storage capacity is often described as temporary, grain kept in bags stacked under tarpaulins of other waterproof covering that may not be fully effective despite the best efforts of the Grain Marketing Board.
Properly done, this sort of storage has worked, so long as grain is fumigated, the rain kept off, rodents controlled and moisture levels rigidly kept low.
But even then, it is not suitable for longer-term storage and at best should only be used for a few months until the grain is sold or otherwise assigned.
Even then, we face losses, grain worth US$32 million a year being estimated to being simply unusable after storage.
This is not a lot considering how much is stored, but it would be useful if the figure was zero.
The costs of storage also need to be reduced. A bag and cover system does need people to be continually checking and making repairs.
At the beginning of the Second Republic the initial idea was to resume building and expanding the large silo complexes, many erected in the 1980s and 1990s until the entire commercial maize crop, that is not kept on the farms for household consumption, could be stored plus the wheat crop, then enough for around half a year.
However, since those 20th century silos there have been technological advances, and a far more modern system was now available, more flexible since we could have more, but smaller silo complexes so ensuring that farmers had silos closer to their farms.
The new silos can now also have continuous electronic monitoring for moisture and other needs, and the grain delivered and extracted is far more accurately measured, ensuring tighter controls and making preventing theft and corruption.
The first of these new silo complexes is being commissioned today in Kwekwe by President Mnangagwa.
The complex has seven of the new silos and between them they can store 56 000 tonnes of grain. Another 13 are planned, and the existing silo complexes will be upgraded to similar standards to give 21 banks of silos.
These new silos, with their extra ventilation, dehumidifiers and other systems, allow the monitoring data to be applied promptly to make sure the grain is kept in top-class condition for as long as wanted, and that is ever more required when we might be needing to store grain from a very good season for a couple of years, even with rotation, through average or bad seasons.
These 21 modern or modernised silo complexes available by 2030 will be able to store between them 1,43 million tonnes of grain, more than twice the present 650 000 tonnes.
At the same time, we would hope that the millers, who are being encouraged to contract farmers to grow more of the grain they need, will also build up their own modern silo capacity.
Ideally, even with the major expansion in irrigation we now have underway which will increasingly ensure that we can grow enough food each year despite periodic droughts and even killer droughts, we should be able to store not just the commercial crop each year but also have at least a six month supply for carryover and emergency.
This is why the Government programme to build up its own silo capacity to 1,43 million tonnes needs to be complemented by the private sector being able to store more of their contracted grain as it is harvested rather than hope they can just rent capacity in the GMB complexes.
At the same time, we need to be able to look at mini-silos for farms. Every farmer keeps some of the grain they grow back from sale for family and farm use and some of that grain has to be stored for at least a year until the next harvest.
These days almost 1 million tonnes of grain is kept back on the farms, and that is almost as large as the part of the harvest that eventually ends up with millers and stockfeed processors.
There are many traditional technologies to make sure that 1 million tonnes is handled well, as well as the sacks under the tarpaulin system, but perhaps the time has come for something more permanent that will save a lot of labour.
On farm metal silos are not unknown in some countries.
The important point of today’s commissioning ceremony is not just that the Second Republic is back to increasing silo capacity, but that it is prepared to embrace new technologies to make sure this is done better and more thoroughly in a cost-effective way.
