Neria’s kicks of fertiliser distribution

NERIA’S Investments limited has kicked off the distribution of fertiliser under the Farmers Input Support Programme (FISP) to all the 14 districts of Eastern Province.

The agro-commodity trading company is expected to deliver over 63,000 Metric tonnes of fertiliser to the rovince for the 2020/2021 farming season. Flagging off the delivery of the commodity to the districts in Chipata yesterday, provincial minister Makebi Zulu said the province is targeting a record maize harvest of about 1 million tonnes next season. Mr Zulu said the province had a bumper harvest in seven crops due to the timely distribution of fertiliser and good rainfall. He said this year, the farmers were expected to start receiving the inputs by September. “As government, this is a game changer for us. It’s a game changer because we realise the potential of Eastern Province. In line with President Edgar Lungu’s instruction to improve agriculture, we have worked tirelessly as a province to make sure the yield is increased,” Mr Zulu said. “Neria’s investments, you did a good job. We moved from maize harvest of 500,000 tonnes, the previous season to 604,000 tonnes this year. If not for the floods in some parts of the province, we would have yielded more,” he said. Mr Zulu said Government would ensure the farmers access the commodity immediately they make their K400 payment. “We want to see to it that every district has inputs on the ground even before the farmers start making their payments of deposit into the bank. The idea is that we should not have any excuse relating to time, that the inputs were not delivered in time, that is a thing of the past since last season,” he said. The minister was elated that the province recorded the highest in seven of the 11 crops. “We recorded the highest harvest in Soya beans, cotton , virgin tobacco, barley tobacco, maize, groundnuts and Sunflower. We hope to be number one in everything and the agriculture extension officers in all districts have been equipped with motorbikes,” he said. Neria’s investments general manager Martin Chaikatisha assured government that the company would complete the delivery of fertiliser in all the districts in the next two weeks. “We have delivered 90 percent of the commodity, about 56,000 tonnes of both urea and D-compound. But trucks from Beira, Mozambique are still coming in, so we should be able to be done with the remaining commodity in the next two weeks,” he said.