Africa Focus: Zimbabwe's food security under threat as strategic reserve remains depleted

Zimbabwe's food security is being threatened by a cocktail of problems, with the state food agency disclosing that its strategic grain reserve is holding much less stock than is required.

The strategic grain reserve is currently holding only 118,000 tons of maize instead of 500,000 tons needed at any given time to be distributed to deficit areas.

The disclosure comes at a time the country suffered poor yields in 2015 and intends to import 700,000 tons of maize to avert hunger.

Zimbabwe requires about 2 million tons annually for both human and livestock consumption but has been failing to meet its requirements for more than a decade now following poor harvests caused by various factors.

These factors include farm disruptions which took place during the land reform period when white commercial farmers were removed to make way for landless blacks, lack of inputs, production inefficiencies, erratic rains and diversification by many farmers from maize to cash crops, especially tobacco.

The government recently appealed to development partners and other stakeholders for at least 300 million U.S. dollars needed for food supplements following the poor 2014/15 agricultural season.

Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa said that the money was required to buy stocks to plug the food deficit until the next harvest after about 300,000 hectares out of an estimated 2 million of planted land was written off.

"While we need 1.4 million tons of maize a year for consumption, our produce for the 2014/15 season has gone down by approximately 49 percent," he said.

The issuance of licenses by the government to companies wanting to import maize has eased the situation and allowed millers to continue providing maize meal to the nation.

But specific to the strategic grain reserve, the Grain Marketing Board (GMB) acting general manager Lawrence Jasi told parliament recently that the state grain procurer was failing to procure and maintain acquired stocks because of lack of funds, with the treasury failing to remit funds on time.

Farmers with the commodity have also not been willing to sell to GMB because of its lengthy delays in paying them.

GMB offers the highest price of 390 U.S. dollars per ton but the farmers opt for private buyers who pay around 180 U.S. dollars per ton because of the ready cash, while others keep the grain for livestock feeding.

As at end of last May, GMB owed the farmers nearly 29 million U. S. dollars for 146,000 delivered in 2014.

The government has also blamed some farmers for poor maize yields through production inefficiencies.

Agriculture deputy minister responsible for livestock development Paddy Zhanda also told parliament that yields were getting poorer from an average of 2 tons per hectare in 1995/6 to 0.85 tonnes per hectare.

"This year it is 0.03 tons per hectare. That is highly unsustainable, highly inefficient that will cause untold suffering which is unbearable on the value chain," he said.

He said there was need to address the issue of productivity.

Most of Southern Africa have recorded maize deficits from the last season, with the biggest producer - South Africa - also set to import to replenish its stocks following a significant drop of 33 percent compared to the 2014 harvest.

According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the region's maize harvest was expected to shrink this year by some 26 percent compared with 2014's bumper crop.

The organization feared that the deficit could trigger food price increases and adversely affect recent food security gains.

"For 2015, the early production forecast for maize - a staple food throughout the sub-region - stands at about 21.1 million tons, some 15 percent lower than the average for the last five years," FAO said end of April.

It said the fall in production was mostly due to the impact of erratic weather conditions, including the late start of seasonal rains in November/December, followed by heavy rains that caused flooding in parts of some countries, and then a long dry spell in the southern areas of the sub-region during February and early March.

The poor outlook is already having some impact on cereal markets. South Africa recorded significant price increases in February - although the rise eased in March following improved rains.

FAO said the poor outlook for 2015 was expected to result in increased imports in Southern Africa with forecasts for aggregate maize imports in the 2015/16 marketing year (May/April) indicating an increase to about 1.8 million tonnes.

Large volumes of maize imports were forecast for Zimbabwe, while larger import volumes than 2014 were also forecast in the deficit-producing countries of Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia and Swaziland.

"With the expected fall in maize production in the sub-region, and the resulting price hikes, the improved food security situation may be reversed in 2015/2016, especially if no timely interventions are made," said Dominique Burgeon, FAO's resilience coordinator. Endi