Minister of Agriculture Sam Kawale says the Agricultural Development and Marketing Corporation (Admarc) has 14,500 metric tonnes of maize ready for distribution across the country.
Kawale said this in Parliament yesterday after some Members of Parliament complained that people in their constituencies are failing to access maize during the lean season as the commodity’s prices keep rising.
Kawale emphasized that about half of the tonnage will be distributed in the first phase of distribution and the ministry has started moving some of the stock from Central and Northern Region going to Southern Region as well as distributing it within the Central Region.
He added that the Northern region is already stocked and they have started selling maize but the Southern Region was the one that had no stock.
“This is just the first part or I should say the first trucks moving. Once they will deliver in those depots they will come back and collect more maize to deliver to the depots omitted in the first trip.
“A lot of Members of Parliament have complained that they haven’t received maize in specific depots and I took my time to explain that this is just the first trip. These trucks have been assigned to deliver the entire country until we get to a point where people have got access to the maize to take them through the next couple of months until they harvest from their fields,” said Kawale.
Kawale also claimed that the donor community has trust in President Lazarus Chakwera’s administration and that is why the World Bank paid NBS Bank to support Admarc settle loans and release maize held by the bank.
Meanwhile, legislator for Machinga East, Ester Jolobala has appealed to the Ministry of Agriculture to put up measures that will allow women to buy maize stocks without being abused or sidelined.
Jolobala cited an example where a relative to one of the members of the August was killed while trying to buy commodities under Affordable Inputs Program, a scenario she described as unfortunate and should not happen again.
Jolobala said women have been victims in accessing government’s products because no proper measure are set up to protect them in different depot.
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