Hope for best, plan for worst in 2017/18 agric season

11 Aug, 2017 - 00:08 0 Views

The ManicaPost

Obert Chifamba Bureau Chief
IN the hustle to put everything in place for the 2017 /18 Command Agriculture programme, it is vital for the country to avoid letting the halo effect of the previous season influence its planning.

Yes, the 2016 /17 season was very successful beyond all reasonable expectations but it owes a significant chunk of its success to the benevolence of nature – the abundant rains that breathed life into everything on the face of the earth, crops included.

This allowed yields to surpass expectation and made everything, natural factors included, look very simple and just surmountable but the reality is that the helping hand of mother nature can easily evade us or come hard on us with a drought so the planning should also focus on how best farmers can tap into the water bodies that litter their farming communities, thanks to last season’s relentless downpours.

Here I am saying that the country needs more investment in irrigation equipment, as rain-fed agriculture’s success is not always guaranteed. With climate change wrecking havoc everywhere, it’s critical not to take chances. Also, preparations for the forthcoming season should go beyond farmers’ registration or input mobilisation but extend to covering serious mechanisation of the farms participating in the programme and the GMB too.

On the farms producing maize, it is critical for Government to consider assisting the farmers secure such implements as tractors to enable them to till large hectarages on time, centre pivots for irrigation, combine harvesters to make the harvesting process simpler, shellers to do the shelling and driers for the controlled drying of grain.

It is necessary for farmers to have driers as most of them are growing long season varieties, which are coming as part of the seed package from the Government.

Long season varieties normally take long to mature and may still be on the field even at like this when winter is almost over so the farmers may need to harvest the maize before it dries completely on its own lest they wade into losses well before they have harvested the maize. This means they also need to have a few driers in their farming communities.

Also on the issue of long season varieties that are making it difficult for some farmers to easily achieve the grain moisture content that GMB wants, it may be prudent for Government to allow farmers to choose varieties that do well in their regions.

On the one hand, GMB should also consider having driers in its premises so that farmers that bring in maize with higher moisture content that the required levels do not have to take it back to the farms but will just have it dried to standard in the premises. This will also eliminate the risk of farmers being duped by middlemen purporting to be doing them a solid yet they will be ripping them off.

In most cases the farmers end up selling the maize to these middlemen to escape the costs of taking it back to the farm and returning after it dries to satisfactory standards. There are also risks of storage losses on the farms, as most farmers do not have the capacity to store huge quantities of grain on their farms without attracting pests that spoil the harvest in the process.

Farmers registering for the programme should also make sure they have the capacity to produce enough to pay off their loans and remain with a significant profit since this programme looks set to eventually create business people out of most farmers participating. It is a programme that teaches farmers to run their operations in a business manner so they do not engage in activities that do not leave their pockets with something.

And for some free advice – farmers need to do soil tests to reduce their production costs, as most of them just apply fertilisers that may even not be needed by their soils or they may apply quantities in excess leaving the soil requiring further chemical treatment that also comes with a cost. It is therefore crucial for them to know the nutrient composition of their soils well before they state their fertiliser or chemical requirements.

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