Agriculture permanent secretary, Isaac Phiri, today took ZAMBEEF to task for allegedly failing to plough back profits into the communities it was operating from.
Speaking when he toured the Namwala ZAMBEEF abattoir today, Professor Phiri challenged the company not only to be interested in making profits but take social responsibility seriously in order to enhance its cooperate image.
Professor Phiri said ZAMBEEF should have taken up the initiative of supplementing government effort in vaccinating cattle in the district when the Foot and mouth disease broke out in the district.
“You are in cattle business and, therefore, you should have taken it upon yourselves to ensure that you protect the livestock population in the district so that your business is not disrupted by cattle movement ban,” said Professor Phiri.
“Your business partners are the cattle farmers and, therefore, you need to plough back to them by ensuring you vaccinate some of their livestock,” he added.
And Professor Phiri accused ZAMBEEF of allegedly exploiting farmers by enforcing what he termed as ‘poor beef prices.’
He noted that was very unfair for the company, after making huge amounts of money form farmers, to charge K9,000 per 130 kilogrammes live weight and K8,000 below 130 Kilogrammes.
“The fact that you are the only buyers of beef here does not give you the right to buy cattle at a price of your wanting without regards for poor farmers,” professor Phiri said while urging farmers in the district to form groupings to increase their bargaining power for the right price for beef.
And southern province ZAMBEEF general manager, Nelson Mawanai, said the company would take the concerns raised seriously.
Now this is what i call working.Not just sitting in offices & gaining weight.Prof Phiri u r ryt on spot.Zambeef has been exploiting these poor farmers for a very long tym.I hope its not just a mere rant but action orientend
Did Nelson Mawanai need a ‘whip’ to awaken him? Couldn’t he see the logic? Some people need perpetual supervision and not to supervise others.
To Prof. Phiri i say keep up awakening those so-called Managers in agro-related sectors.
Take Zambeef to task also for not franchising in order to create employment or support for enterprenuership.Instead this big companies cuts all pipo by producing farm products like chickens,beef, etc but still sells direct to the public thro their outlets like zamchicks.Why can’t they empower zambians by frnachising these outlets to the public.I know it means abit more expensive chicken+chips, but an enterpreneur would have been created hence help ease uneployment.They are a bunch of selfish pipo.Good start bwana PS.
What we need is competition, not these monoploies. If Zambeef buys the meat so cheap, why is it so expensive for consumers ?
Iwe Ka phiri, don’t just offer lip service! Where were you when these muzungus gained so much muscle to exploit the farmers. In the night you are buzy chewing the profits with your muzungus and then in the dat you want to blind fold us, stupid *****.
welcome to capitalism – maximum profits for minimum costs. I thought we got rid of socialism in 1991 and now we have a govt official chastising a company for carrying out its duty to its shareholders. Does the govt want to work with companies to improve the local people/area or are do they resort to extortionate rhetoric. Anybody looked at zambian govt policies and say, botswana investment policies? It is easy to talk about empowerment and yet do nothing about it.
Prof Phiri see to it that ZamBif impliment what has promised to do,otherwise if u won’t follow it up,they will relax.Wake them up & yoself.
#5 cursed is the womb that conceived you, you lunatick.
Prof Phiri, is Zambeef going to start vaccinating cattle the whole country ? Please understand their business first before you start blaming them. Zambeef is not a government institution. The shareholders have a say in the running of the company. It is up to the shareholders and the management to decide some of the issues affecting the operations of the company Bwana Prof.
Cheers !
#9, i totally dis-agree with u. These are companies hiding in the name of zambianisation. Look at wat celtel, MTN and other small companies are doing…ploughing back into the community. Zambeef is even able to open outlets out of zambia coz it is exploiting zambians by making huge profits. If i were Prof Phiri, i wud close the company. We will oso start xenophobic attacks so that these pipo realise our seriuosnes. Amasuku balya yafula. Sozi i know your father works at zam-mbifi.
#8 the only difference between you and an as*hole is that you have a brain full of sh*t. Stick you ‘ule’ where the sun never shine (as*)
How about this: there should be a way for farmers nationwide to sell their beef at Lusaka market prices (minus the cost of transportation). All farmers should be able to get somewhere near market prices for their product. That in itself would do a lot to reduce rural poverty. The state could do that, and even make a tiny profit on it.
9. Sozi,
I completely agree with you. However, this is what you get when ideology replaces parastatals with ‘the free market’. Neolibs expect the market to take care of everything, including things that are the government’s business. Cattle vaccination should be done by the ministry of agriculture. If they want to finance that through taxes that is fine, but it isn’t to a privately held agrobusiness to go around the country vaccinating cattle and telling them to do so is not ‘holding them to task’ as the article’s title states.
Vaccinations is the responsibility of the government and not private companies . please use the money bidgeted for
Zambeef embalming the nation…….. they have no respect for human life and health not even the professionals who did the preliminary test on their stocks… now they are sending the meat stocks to the labs in Germany who are in ther pockets! rubbish these people will never do business in Zambia Ever!!!!!!!
maybe the govnt can spend less on fancy land cruisers and allocate the same to supporting the livestock sector, also since it seems so profitable , i wonder how many of us are willing to go in, buy cattle and get into the business, easy to sit and castigate…….