AGRICULTURE IN DANGER
WITH only three months to go before the onset of the rainy season attempts to a disgruntled member of the Indaba Agricultural Policy Research Institute (IAPRA) has exposed a scheme to resurrect the much maligned e-voucher system of distributing subsidised farm inputs to hundreds of thousands of vulnerable but viable small-scale farmers.
At least 10 named NGOs are reportedly scheming to create chaos in the FISP and their agenda is to push Government into using the e-voucher system because they are aware that it will be a total failure, to the advantage of the opposition going towards the 2021 elections.
e plot has been described as a recipe for chaos and failure of the agriculture sector from which the Patriotic Front (PF) government will not survive.
e e-voucher, under the Farmer Input Support Programme (FISP), has been an unmitigated failure because of its cumbersome implementation and administrative bottlenecks
that have left many farmers destitute. e Small Scale Farmers Development Agency (SAFADA) has called on the government to avert the looming disaster in the agriculture sector by involving the private sector.
“ e government should work with the private sector to make sure agro-inputs that are already positioned in many parts of the country are distributed immediately,” SAFADA president Boyd Moombye said.
Mr Moombye said the failure of the e-voucher system could not be attributed to Government but to the agro-dealers engaged to distribute the inputs.
He said Government should engage farmers unions to create sanity because the problem was with the supply chain.
is would avert the failure of the system being anticipated.
As government searches for a solution to the ills that have best FISP, a plot in which some foreign-funded non-Governmental organisations (NGOs), in collusion with a named opposition political party, are scheming to sabotage the agriculture sector and limit the PF’s chances of winning the 2021 elections has been condemned.
According to a worried source within the Indaba Agricultural Policy and Research Institute (IAPRI), the plan is to push Government into succumbing to distributing inputs under the FISP to farmers using the e-voucher system despite nancial constraints so that farmers do not get their inputs on time. is, the source said, is contrary to what the Zambia National Farmers Union (ZNFU) has proposed.
e union has urged Government to revert to direct distribution of the inputs for this season and dismantling arrears owed to agro dealers.
e source warned yesterday that if President Edgar Lungu allowed these organisations, he might as well bid farewell to the presidency as they were determined to have him out of power.
“A cartel has been created with assistance from foreign donors to bring down President Lungu by sabotaging the agriculture sector. is cartel sat and deliberated on how this e-voucher system can be sabotaged realising knowing that Government is nancially constrained
“What they want is that the challenges in input distribution must be perpetually sustained as the country draws closer to the 2021 elections in order to boost chances of the opposition winning the elections.
“ ey want to use the delay in the distribution of inputs as a campaign strategy against the PF. ey have realised that direct input supply will be e ective and e cient,” the well-placed source said. He said the force within the cartel was big with a strong nancial muscle form foreign entities and that Government should be alert and get to the bottom of the matter by identifying the sponsors.
“Let Government investigate the people who paid for the advertorial over this case and what their motivation is. President Lungu must be very careful with some of the so-called stakeholders in the agriculture sector because they don’t mean well,” the source said.
“Some agro dealers have not yet been paid for last season’s supplies and the rains are around the corner. Where will Government nd money to meet all these expenses? is is a calculated move which will boomerang once implemented. ey have even produced an advertorial in the tabloids to ensure that they sway perception and create chaos,” he warned.
His warning renovates with SAFADA’s advice.
Mr Moombye, the SAFADA president, said if Government engaged the unions in the supply chain they would be held accountable if they delayed farmers in accessing inputs.
He said currently Government cannot hold anyone accountable because the agro dealers could give numerous excuses and it was the farmers were su ering.