Farmers Union Celebrates 100 Years

Source from:  The Times of Zambia (Ndola) Annie Sampa 10/18/2005

CLOCKING 100 years of existence on October 11 Zambia National Farmers Union (ZNFU) has made strides of uniting farmers countrywide for Zambia's economic prosperity. Having been initiated in 1905 the union started as a farmers' association in Eastern Province soon after the first large-scale farms were established. Before 1964, the union was called Northern Rhodesia National Farmers' Union, (NRNFU) which later became the Commercial Farmers' Bureau (CFB). Until independence, its membership had been almost entirely confined to large-scale farmers, however, the number of small-scale accelerated in the early 80s. Close to 1992, CFB became outdated and misleading therefore, changed to ZNFU and their mission statement being that of safeguarding and promoting members' interests. Celebrating their 100th annual congress at Mulungushi International Conference centre in Lusaka, ZNFU provided a unique opportunity to farmers and other stakeholders to interact. According to ZNFU president Mr Guy Robinson, their major achievement has been to unite small and large-scale farmers under one umbrella to speak with one voice. Two years ago with the agreement of agribusinesses, ZNFU established the chamber thereby representing all the mutually dependant parts of the industry which has made things easy for Government as in the past received conflicting signals from private sectors resulting in wrong decisions. On the unions failures and challenges Robinson bemoaned, "We are yet to find a formula that will induce quick response from Government on agreed programmes as they have acted correctly sometimes but late when the damage has already been done. We have reached several agreements in the past, which have simply not been implemented leaving the agricultural players frustrated. Robinson observed the growth of 30% in major crops and livestock of almost 100% in the tobacco and improvements in the cotton industry that captures more than 200,000 small-scale farmers and other non-traditional exports amounting to US$485 million in 2004, nonetheless, lamented that the increased agricultural production was under threat from livestock diseases, unstable Kwacha exchange rates, Value Added Tax (VAT) impositions, excessive council levies, fuel price and supply problems, high interest rates, market distortions and unrestricted imports from more developed economies. He congratulated Government for qualifying to the HIPC adding that with the development, the stock of external debt, which has been reduced by US$ 3.9 billion from US$7.1 billion will provide an opportunity for Government to channel more resources into services and infrastructure. "In this regard we want to remind Government of the promises they made by reverting to the pre-2004 VAT zero-rated status of affected products, elimination of double VAT liability on leased capital goods and all other discriminatory measures which increase the administrative burden," he uttered. Robinson further grieved that farmers are still waiting for the fulfillment of the promise as burden on all categories has increased, raising production costs which have influenced domestic prices and therefore, inflation and competitiveness of the sector. He said food security and investment is also slowing down and cautioned Government to respond on the state of the Irrigation Fund, which was put on hold because of the HIPC. The cost of finance is high with farmers failing to cope with bank obligations, hence he deplored commercial banks for not adopting progressive agricultural financing packages that exist in other countries seeing that small-scale farmers in Zambia have limited initiatives such as the Fertilizer Support Programme, which is only targeting 125,000, they will be no improvement Since maize is an expensive crop to grow with all rising costs and the effects of drought, a farmer requires a better price to survive and they should not be criticised for high mealie meal prices. Farming is a business and no farmer can continue to produce at a loss. "It is unfortunate that each time the cost goes up, the easiest scapegoat has been a farmer, Is a farmer responsible for the rising input costs and the weather?" he asked. He further heartened farmers to adopt good farming methods as poor rains over the last season lead to depressed average yields. For instance, maize yields were as low as one tonne per hectare, however small-scale farmers who had employed conservation farming techniques managed to produce in excess of 5 metric tones per hectare in many cases and did not find the drought as devastating as those on traditional cultivation systems. He urged Government to develop the rural infrastructure that limited access to markets so that suppliers of inputs and buyers were encouraged to do business in rural areas additionally expected it to consider setting up an emergency fund to cope with major outbreaks of livestock diseases particularly foot and mouth and contagious bovine pleural pneumonia that have negative effects on animals. In the recent past, enactment of legislation without adequate consultation with stakeholders, for example FRA legislation went straight to parliament and cotton industry was subjected to a major change by enactment of the Cotton Act and a proposed water legislation is in advanced stages but in direct contradiction of stakeholders concerns, while farmers also need assurance regarding security of land tenure. Robinson advised Local Government and Housing Ministry to speed up the initiative of developing guidelines on council levies as they were becoming an additional form of tax on the sector and thanked the agriculture ministry for effectively addressing the issues of tobacco industry as the Act is being reviewed with the aim of tackling concerns on tobacco marketing, regulation and others. Moreover, ZNFU needs indication from Government of what the future holds for fuel suppliers as marketing of inputs and produce, other farm activities continues to be negatively affected by erratic