• The Head of State and his new dawn administration have lobbied with chain stores to accept local products.
• Those that are complaining that the quality of onion is not good; BuyZed has a problem with such kind of people.
• People that are offering the shelf space, producers and funding agencies have to work together and come up with a lasting solution.
BuyZed Campaign has called on chain stores and funding agencies to work together and help small scale farmers to produce good quality products especially onion.
Speaking in an interview with Money FM News, Organization Founder Evans Ngoma said now that the Head of State has lobbied with chain stores to accept local products, it is the farmers’ responsibility to work towards satisfying the local market.
Mr. Ngoma stated that there is need to educate the farmers on how the products should be before they are put on the shelf space seeing that chain stores have standards with which they want to fill their shelf space.
“Those that are complaining that the quality of onion is not good, us as BuyZed have got a problem with such kind of people. The Head of State and his new dawn administration have lobbied with these chain stores to accept local products, now the onus is on all of us to begin to work towards satisfying the local market.”
“Yes they have standards with which they want to fill their shelf space so if those standards are not met, it is a thing of sitting together and educating one another on how the product should be before they are put on the shelf space,” Mr. Ngoma stated.
He added that once this is done, government will not be compelled to look outside Zambia for things that the country is able to produce, hence the need to build capacity, and ensure that what is produced is value for money.
“So it is a share responsibility, let us build capacity, let us ensure that what we produce is value for money that is the only way we are going to grow our economy. People that are offering the shelf space, producers and maybe funding agencies they have to work together and come up with a lasting solution,” he added.
