The Civil Society Scaling Up Nutrition Alliance, CSO-SUN says it has noted that a number of other crops that can complement the dietary needs of the Country such as groundnut production have declined despite the projected bumper harvest.
Speaking in an interview with Money FM News, Alliance Country Coordinator Matthews Mhuru said the alliance has, however, welcomed the news of the country recording a maize bumper harvest.
“We receive the information from the Ministry of Agriculture that the country will have a bumper harvest with gladness especially that Zambia is coming from a very difficult times concerning crop production,” Mr. Mhuru said.
“This implies that the country will see a reduction in mealie meal prices and maize products.”
Mr Mhuru added that food security emphasizes the need for crop production in a Country to meet dietary demands explaining that production of more maize at the expense of other crops will not be in line with the requirements of food security in the Country.
“There has been a reduction in crops such as groundnuts so already when you look at the nutrient benefits from crops displayed so far it becomes very sad when the country fails to produce more crops of nutrition value that would meet the dietary needs of the citizenry,” he said.
“We therefore urge the ministry of Agriculture to ensure that the 2020-2021 farming season they can be more support of diversification of nutrition based crops so that the dietary needs of the population is met.”
Recently, Agriculture Minister Michael Katambo announced that Zambia has returned to bumper Maize harvest this year after it recorded an estimated 3,387,469 metric tonnes in the 2019-2020 agriculture season.
Mr Katambo said this is an increase from the 2,004,389 metric tonnes produced last season and represents an increase of 69 percent.