1,000 farmers earmarkedfor skills training

MORE than 1000 small-scale farmers will undergo training in village banking and entrepreneurship skills in the Southern Province, Zambia Chamber of Small and Medium Businesses Association

ZCSMBA, chief executive officer Moto Ng’ambi has disclosed.

He said the association trained 60 trainers in Monze and Gwembe who will in turn train members in their community in village banking, entrepreneurship, farming as a business as well as how to write a will.

Mr Ng’ambi said in an interview with the Daily Nation that the trainers were expected to train members of their communities in the next two months.

“We did a needs assessment in Monze and Gwembe to ascertain how we will help build the capacity of the farmers by developing their skills. Each of the communities provided 10 members for the training of trainers’ workshop.

“And through them we are looking to train over 1000 small scale farmers. The idea is for farmers to move away from dependence on maize and diversify to crops like mushroom and soya beans which have accessible markets,” he said.

He explained that the association’s major focus now was to concentrate on major market linkages for the farmers to have improved access to markets and knowledge on crops that could be easily sold.

Mr Ng’ambi said ZCSMBA would partner with the Zambia Commodity Exchange (ZAMACE) to get more information on crops that were on the market and what consumers are ready to buy on the platform.

He said farmers growing soya beans would benefit from the market provided by the Copperbelt Energy Corporation for bio fuel production.

He said the trainers would go back to the districts soon to get a progress report on the project.