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Elita Chikwati Senior Agriculture Reporter
The Grain Marketing Board (GMB) is engaging transporters to ferry grain from collection points to the nearest depots.
The board has also increased collection points to 1 365 as part of efforts to decongest depots in compliance with Covid-19 safety guidelines and to bring convenience to farmers.
This comes as more than 600 000 tonnes have been delivered to the parastatal, surpassing the country’s Strategic Grain Reserve (SGR) requirement.
GMB should at any given time have at least 500 000 tonnes of grain in its reserve for national food security.
In an advisory yesterday, the GMB said he parastatal was identifying more collection points.
“The GMB is inviting transporters interested in collecting grain from collection points at GMB depots to register at their nearest GMB depots for consideration,” it said. “For commercial farmers, the GMB can arrange transport of grain and payment of transport will be made on a stop order facility.
“A total of 1 365 collection points have been identified and traditional leaders working with the GMB and Agritex are identifying more collection points.”
GMB chief executive, Mr Rockie Mutenha confirmed that grain deliveries had surpassed 600 000 tonnes.
“We are receiving about 12 000 tonnes on a daily basis,” he said.
“So far, we have over 600 000 tonnes of grains. Over half a million of the grains is maize so our depots are busy as farmers intensify deliveries.”
GMB is also encouraging farmers to group, move their grains to one collection point and approach their nearest depot manager to assist them with transport to ferry produce to the depot.
GMB procures grain on behalf of the Government to ensure national food security.
Zimbabwe is expecting around three million kilogrammes of grain, the biggest harvest in 20 years.
The bumper harvest has been attributed to good rains and the Pfumvudza/Intwasa programme which saw many farmers attaining high yields.
Online Reporter