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Dim prospects for winter wheat

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WILL farmers this winter cropping season produce adequate wheat with less than three weeks to May 15, the deadline for planting and a host of challenges yet to be taken care of?
Last year wheat production declined to 24 700 metric tonnes from 33 700 metric tonnes in 2012 with reduction in crop hectarage cited as the major contributing factor. 
Lack of inputs and tight liquidity constraints are some of the challenges drawing back wheat production in the country.
Experts project the hectarage to go down this year as most farmers have not even prepared the land.
The planting date for winter wheat traditionally is May 1 and the cut off is the 15th of the same month.
The uncertainty in the wheat production sector is worrying as farmers would have taken advantage of the anticipated rise in the price of the commodity on the international market on the back of challenges affecting major producers of the crop.
Freezing weather in the United States of America has raised fears of possible shortages, while Ukraine which supplies six percent of the world’s wheat export market is currently faced with political instability.
Zimbabwe Farmers Union (ZFU) vice-president, Berean Mukwende said wheat farmers were struggling because they were receiving limited support from stakeholders.
“It seems this season no one is prepared to fund winter wheat farming,” Mukwende said.
“Most farmers need financial support and without any support the output levels will either decline or we will produce the same quantities produced last year.”
It was saddening, said Mukwende, that millers who had promised to support farmers were not forthcoming.
“Initially millers had said they were going to fund some farmers, but to date, nothing has been done and there is no movement from their part to show their willingness to support the farmers,” he said.
“Only a few farmers are in position to fund their own operations.
“There is a misconception that farmers want ‘free’ things, but if clear financial support packages are put in place, farmers will definitely do the best they can to produce and repay loans.”
Mukwende said some farmers were reluctant to grow wheat this season due to incessant power outages and low selling price of the crop on the local market.
He said farmers were also moving away from the crop due to decreasing yields and skills gap to achieve good harvest per hectare. “Farmers are never sure of the supply of electricity and financial support so most end up abandoning the crop,” said Mukwende.
“With electricity we normally do not have challenges at the start of the season in May, but as the season progresses power outages increase.
Mukwende said the fact that farmers were not satisfied by the prices offered by buyers was another setback.
“Some farmers were not impressed with the prices offered last season by the buyers,” he said.
“For a farmer to break-even with the US$450 per tonne offered last season, they should have produced at least four and a half tonnes per hectare, but only a few manage to get such high yields.
“Most farmers last season failed to make a profit or break even.”
Last year private buyers were offering farmers between US$400 and US$450 per tonne while farmers were arguing that basing on the import parity price, a tonne should be US$500.
The anticipated decline will result in the country once again having to rely on imports.
Zimbabwe requires 450 000 tonnes of wheat to meet its annual consumption requirement and the balance has always been met through imports.
The failure to meet demand has resulted in a wheat import bill of over US$500 million per annum as Government resorts to close the deficit.
Mukwende said there was need for Government to review the prices of imported flour.
“Bakers maintain that it is cheaper to import flour than to rely on locally produced flour hence the lack of support,” he said.
“Government should create a situation whereby the country relies on imports to augment the gap left by local farmers not that we rely on imports to feed the nation.”
Efforts to improve wheat production will be in line with the Government plans under the Zimbabwe Agenda for Sustainable Socio-Economic Transformation (Zim-ASSET) to support the agriculture sector to ensure food security.

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