The Civil Society Scaling Up Nutrition Alliance has urged government to find ways of helping struggling farmers who have failed to pay the K400 contribution to access farming inputs under the Farmer Input Support Programme.
The CSO-SUN has received information that some peasant farmers who are beneficiaries of FISP in some parts of the country are failing to pay K400 required to access the inputs for the 2019/2020 farming season because they do not have any money.
With majority of Peasant farmers depending on farming for their income, the poor harvest in the 2018/2019 farming season impacted their livelihoods with most of them failing to even buy food for their families hence they cannot afford a K400 to pay for the inputs, according to Mathews Mhuru.
Mr Mhuru the CSO-SUN Country Coordinator says owing to the poor harvests this year, most farmers did not sell anything hence have no money to pay for inputs and government must find ways of helping them.
He has suggested that government should consider allowing the vulnerable farmers to access inputs and let them pay later to enable them prepare adequately for the 2019/2020 farming season.
He has warned that failure by the farmers to prepare adequately for the farming season will result into continued hunger in the country as most of them will not harvest anything thereby putting pressure on relief distribution by government.
“What has made this so exceptional is the ban on the movement of livestock in some parts of the country which further constrained farmers from making any money as they could not sell their animals”, Mr Mhuru has said.
Meanwhile, Mr Mhuru has reiterated his call on government to be strategic in the distribution of seed to prevent poor harvests and guarantee household food security in case of another drought in the 2019/2020 farming season.
Mr Mhuru said with normal to above normal rainfall expected in most parts of the country in the coming farming season, government must consider distribution drought resistant crops such as beans, sorghum and wheat to drought prone areas.
He is not impressed that other than maize seed and fertiliser, government is only distributing cassava tubers to farmers which are not adequate in diversifying agriculture production and addressing malnutrition.
Mr Mhuru said although there is a ready market for Cassava in the mines and for alcohol production, government needs to distribute other crops such as beans and ground nuts which will also help diversify food consumption.
What is your main objectives MR CSO-SUN ? So you the so called NGO s your main purpose is to make noise. You do receive alot of funding from your Funders. What is the work of that money ? Help those people you have money dont just fatten your belly. If I was a president I would have banned some of the NGOs because they are just confusing people.
H-ask HH he may help using PANAMA lout.