Zambia has robust maize stocks and sees little risk in using them to partly fill a regional gap as a supply crunch looms in southern Africa, pushing up futures prices for the staple and accelerating food inflation.

South Africa is now importing maize to make up for deficits due to export commitments, while Malawi, which recorded a series of bumper crops helped by subsidies, has suspended exports because of reported shortages.

But Zambia, which is exporting to South Africa, Zimbabwe, Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Mozambique, Botswana, Burundi and Namibia, feels it has enough stocks.

“We are monitoring the situation very carefully to ensure that we don’t end up importing maize. I think we are standing on very firm ground in terms of food security,” Zambia’s Agriculture Minister Emmanuel Chenda said.

“We had more than one million tonnes of surplus maize. We decided to export 600,000 tonnes because we didn’t have storage space and so far we have sold 200,000 tonnes,” he said.

But analysts are concerned about Lusaka’s costly spend on maize purchases from farmers, done via the Food Reserve Agency.

Brian Tembo, an Economics Association of Zambia analyst, said the government was buying the maize at above market prices and selling it at reduced prices. He said this meant the government was effectively using “Treasury funds to subsidise the region.”

Zambia harvested 3 million tonnes of maize in the 2010/11 season, from the 2.8 million tonnes the previous season. Zambia’s maize season runs from October to August.

Zambia’s big yields have been attributed to government subsidies to peasant farmers in the form of fertilizer and seeds. However, the crop ultimately depends on rain and the agriculture minister has said the 2011/12 season had gotten off to a bad start because of erratic weather.

[Reuters]

Zamtel has announced its marked mobile subscriber growth from less than 100, 000 to a million customers in within 12 months. Zamtel Chief Commercial Officer, Amon Jere, attributed the one million milestone to diligent leadership with an abated focus on investment into the Zamtel network.

The nation’s only total communication solutions provider has over the past 12 months invested to expand the GSM coverage from 261 sites to above 400 sites while at the same time deploying over 250 new 3G sites in the key cities across Zambia.

“I am proud to say that through an execution of a number of initiatives, our mobile market share has also grown from 3.5% to 11% and our broadband subscriber base has grown from 100 or so subscribers at the beginning of the year to over 4,000,” said Mr. Jere.

As a result of the successful implementation of a number of initiatives to improve efficiency levels, Zamtel posted an EBITDA margin of 13% at the end of 2011, the first time in the recent history of the company that a positive EBITDA margin was recorded.

In addition to the above positive developments, management also expanded the network core, implemented a new billing system, deployed a new ISP core and a number of Value Added Services, all adding up to the Zamtel growth.

Further, as part of the company’s strategic action to improve customer touch points, Zamtel managed to count six newly fitted centers –Manda Hill, Cross Roads, Cairo Mall, Lumumba Road, Livingstone Falls Park Mall and Levy Business Park. In addition, renovation works have advanced at Ridgeway which will also act as the regional office for Lusaka while the centres in Kitwe and Chipata are on schedule to be completed within quarter one of 2012.

And in living up to its brand promise of enabling lives, Zamtel launched a unique CSR program –Water for Life in partnership with World Vision, committing K2 billion in the first phase to bring clean water to approximately 1500 households in 9 districts across Zambia.

Zamtel is 75 percent owned by the Lap Green Group of Libya, with the Zambian Government retaining 25 percent share holding. Lap Green has its footprint in six African markets, providing voice, data, fixed, internet and business continuity services to more than 4 million customers.

Upon privatization in July 2010, Lap GreenN embarked on an investment program of USD 170 million. The first phase of the investment program focused on expanding the GSM network coverage from 197 to 440 as at November 2011, and a 3G network being deployed in all the major cities across the country.

Following the re-organization, Zamtel recruited new talent and invested heavily in training and developing of its employees while at the same time building a new brand that is appealing to Zambians.

These measures resulted in the growth of mobile market share from 3.5% to 11%, 3000% growth of fixed broadband customers, a boost of revenues by 50%, staffing costs being reduced from 80% to 23% of revenues and overall operating costs being reduced from ZMK 431 billion as at 31 March 2010 to ZMK 190 Billion, representing a 55% reduction.

A TEAM from Standard and Poor’s (S&P), a renowned international rating agency is in Zambia to review the country’s economic performance and structural issues. This is the first time that S&P team is in the country to assess Zambia’s performance following the rating of B+ last year.

Secretary to the Treasury Fredson Yamba confirmed in an interview that the team arrived in Lusaka over the weekend. The delegation is expected to hold meetings with various Government ministries and the private sector among them the Economics Association of Zambia and the Bankers Association of Zambia.

Mr Yamba said the team is expected to wind up its assessments on Zambia by Friday and present a report to Government. In a separate interview, Standard Chartered Zambia, head global markets dealing, Stanley Tamele said economic fundamentals in Zambia are strong and positive, adding that the re-evaluation of the country’s performance should not worry anyone.

Mr Tamele said assessments of a country’s performance by rating agencies are routine. He said Zambia can be rated with a B+, upgraded or downgraded depending on the performance. He said the rating and proposal by Government to issue a US$500 million euro bond targeted for infrastructure development is a good sign for economic growth.

He said by and large, the economic outlook for the country is very positive considering that last year Zambia went through an election in September that had an element of political risk but not so big considering that there is a new Government and things are stable.

“There is confidence back in the economy, we see the Kwacha in the short-term reducing to K5,050 from where it is (K5,200) and steadily making progress to about K4,900 levels,” he said.

Mr Tamele said the assessment of Zambia by S&P should not cause anxiety considering that some European countries that have had their rating were downgraded due debt crisis and defaulting on debt.

“The outlook for our economy is very positive, sub-Saharan growth is expected to be very high compared to Western where it’s expected to be very minimal…the fundamentals look good and positive and I don’t think there is much to worry especially in relation to what is happening in the Euro zone,” he said.

Some countries in the Euro zone have had their rating downgraded due to the debt crisis.

[Zambia Daily Mail]

One miner has died in an underground accident at the Chinese owned Collum Coal Mine while two others are battling for their lives at Maamba Hospital in Sinazongwe district.

Sinazongwe District Administrative Officer Sokoluku Daka, Sinazongwe Member of Parliament Richwell Siamunene and
Nkanddabwe Ward Councilor Partson Mangunje confirmed the accident that happened on Tuesday 17th January at 13:30 hours.

An eye witness, Geshom Muchindu, a miner who was underground at the time of the accident disclosed that the accident occurred after blasting underground.

Mr. Muchindu alleged that before dust settled the Chinese supervisor ordered them to go and work in the tunnel where blasting had just been done.He said there was a rock fall on three of the miners and killed one on the spot
while the others were severely injured.

And one of the injured, Dought Mudenda also said the Chinese Supervisor only named as Ruin forced them to enter the tunnel where blasting was done and allegedly threatened them that he would deduct their working hours if they refused.

However, the Chinese supervisors at Shaft three where the accident happened refused to comment and claimed that they did not understand English.

Mr. Daka named the deceased as Gibson Siachivwenya aged 37 and the two injured person as Wispo Mayiya aged 36, and Dought Mudenda aged 23.

Meanwhile, Sinazongwe Member of Parliament Richwell Siamunene has condemned the incident and attributed it to poor safety measures that the company management have been using to conduct their underground mining activities.

Mr. Siamunene called on the Ministry of Mines to give the public the full details of the report pertaining to the operations of the mine where accidents have continued to occur.

And Nkanddabwe Ward Councilor Partson Mangunje said government should look into the safety of the mine to protect the lives of miners.

Mr. Mangunje said despite the Ministry of Mines officers inspecting all shafts at the mine the public has not been informed about the safety of the Chinese owned Collum Coal mine.

He alleged that management has no qualified personnel to handle the explosives used for blasting underground.

The body of the deceased miner is at Maamba Hospital Mortuary.

[Zanis]