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Obert Chifamba Agri-Insight
IN recent years, many rural farmers have turned into traders of a little bit of every crop they produce on their land. They grow and sell different crops at different times in different quantities.
You visit their farms and you come back with a couple of fresh mealies — go back again and you leave with a rooster or something else. The list is endless and so happens to be the small streams of income.
It is, however, the figures generated from the multiple sales that can easily become a source of consternation for those who are serious about seeing farming getting the treatment of a real business enterprise.
The prices at which they sell the produce is usually too little and random to impact on their socio-economic realities, so they end up on the losing end in terms of profits.
The most worrisome issue is that these farmers in most cases fail to negotiate viable prices if they chance to deal with unscrupulous buyers, which makes it imperative for them to team up with others when seeking markets and setting prices.
The power of numbers always matters when negotiating prices and even searching for lucrative markets.
Zimbabwe Farmers Union (ZFU) executive director Mr Paul Zakariya has always urged smallholder producers to understand and appreciate the power of combining forces to create enough volumes of produce that can command respect on the markets.
“Aggregation of produce at the farmer level is a must if smallholder farmers are going to be taken seriously while producing a good quality product and ensuring that there is enough of the product to meet a pre-determined market is key to successful smallholder agricultural businesses,” he always says.
In fact, smallholder farmers must formalise their operations and operate as private companies, cooperative companies or cooperative societies.
These formal businesses should be known for delivering on specific issues such as aggregation and marketing, processing, transport and so forth.
Of course, individual producers may produce on their plots, but it may make sense to have farmer-owned business platforms for aggregation, processing and marketing.
On the one hand, the farmers must always remember that every time they make decisions on activities to do for income generation, their choices must also answer to three factors — productivity, profitability and sustainability.
They need to make sure they have strategies to reach productive levels that make it profitable to roll out their programmes in a manner that makes them sustainable in the long term.
The producers will also need to explore the potential of the commodities they elect to produce, while the acquisition of the requisite technical skills through farmer training, field days and active interaction with technical extension officers must not be overlooked.
It will also be crucial for the farmers to explore potential markets and align the quality of what they intend to produce with the tastes of those markets.
It will not make business sense for the farmers to produce crops or livestock just for their local markets in most cases, as these normally come as random buyers.
They will need to target markets that will regularly come for their produce and not wait for occasions when there is something happening.
This will also help the farmers in their preparations of budgets for each and every commodity and also eliminate loss-making commodities (unless the commodities are meant exclusively for household consumption) and not for external markets.
External markets demand excellency in everything related to quality, hence the need for farmers to be at their best right from the planning through to the marketing phases.
All this will only be possible if the farmers take time to up their skills in a more positive manner.
Government, on its part should also support these initiatives through the enactment of supportive policies, infrastructural development and sound regulatory decisions.
At the moment, public support to agriculture needs to be channelled towards infrastructure development (feeder roads, communication, connectivity, rail, marketing facilities), market research and sound pricing structures.
Farmers should be capacitated to procure inputs through loans and other structured financing schemes that are private sector-led in order to ensure sustainable growth of rural economies.
There are those farmers operating under irrigation schemes who can always do the wise thing of approaching the business development managers deployed in their various localities by the Agricultural and Rural Development Authority (ARDA) to get advice on strategies to use.
These managers work hand in hand with Agritex extension officers also deployed throughout the country so farmers can get expert advice on smart ways of doing business and the correct agronomic instructions too.
This idea of just waking up and start rolling out a programme because the neighbouring farmer is doing it will not give the farmers meaningful earnings but create opportunities for them to waste resources.
Smallholder farmers in most rural communities produce a variety of products at household level with a typical rural homestead for a successful farmer is most likely to be known for producing field crops that are relevant to the agro-ecological region.
In most cases, this may include grains mixed with legumes, oil seeds, cotton and sugar beans while other commodities grown may be horticultural in nature.
This farmer category in most cases has both small livestock and cattle. The aim at this level goes beyond meeting household food and nutrition requirements.
The ultimate goal is to sell excess commodities in order to make improvements to the homestead facilities, maintain already established facilities, access social services and purchase what cannot be produced on the farm.
The household usually realises all its food and nutrition requirements from the production of these commodities with very little being sourced from outside.
Inter-cropping farming methods that are used at this level have the advantage of replenishing the soils, while they also help ensure that fewer nutrients may need to be brought from outside, which makes them cost effective.
It is also important to note that wider varieties of produce cushion the households from the vagaries of climate change and variability.
They also create room for farmers’ participation at the markets, albeit, with quantities that always fail to satiate demand, hence the need to review the volumes pushed into the markets in the light of the ever-growing demand.
The benefits aside, this practice is labour demanding and potential farm workers may not be readily available because of the competing opportunities.
This usually leaves the family farming unit at risk of missing on opportunities to specialise and maximise on the potential of commodities.
Sometimes, the spreading of time, resources and skills thinly may not bring the desired outcomes.
Online Reporter