Indian oil firm to support local soya beans farmers

RUTENDO RORI

Indian edible oil firm Mount Meru Millers has called on local farmers to grow more soya beans, a critical raw material   for making cooking oil, indicating the company was ready to support them.

Apparently, soya beans are in short supply in the country, forcing edible oil firms to import crude oil for companies to manufacture cooking oil.

Meru Millers last week opened a US$20m cooking oil refinery plant in Seke, Mashonaland East Province.

The company’s chief financial officer, Satyavrat Katti, who spoke at the official opening of the  Mount Meru Millers ‘oil refinery plant last week,  said the company was currently importing crude from other countries in the Sadc region.

“Currently, the soya crude comes from the Sadc region but once we see that farmers are ready for more production, then we will start to buy the soya from nearby farmers,” Katti said.

He added: “We have also done the same in other countries like Uganda, where the area has been transformed due to our investments. So we encourage farmers to do more farming. I don’t see any reason why it cannot happen in Zimbabwe.”

Katti said the company has created employment for about 200 people.

“This project started three years ago and we have invested US$20m in it.  For us the most important thing is to positively impact the community and area around us. That is the most important agenda we have before we invest. We are glad we have done that and we have already employed 200 locals,” he said.

Mashonaland East Provincial Affairs and Devolution Aplonia Munzverengwi, who also spoke at the said event, said the development showed that the government’s open door policy was bearing fruits.

“We are so excited that a company has opened a cooking oil processing plant in our province. This cooking oil is being processed from soya beans, which shows that our listening president, since the day he went into office he has been saying Zimbabwe is open for business. These are the fruits of what he said when he came into office,” she said.

“This also shows that companies are decentralising. There is congestion now in Harare and they have now seen that they can also perform very well outside the capital city. “The raw material is also found in the provinces, so it will be a bonus for us in the province to make sure we now need to engage our farmers to produce enough soya to feed this oil refinery plant.

She added: “In terms of devolution, this is what we have been looking for, to have companies in our provinces, and of late we have seen a number of companies coming up to establish themselves in Mashonaland East. So, we are saying in Mashonaland East we welcome more companies in various sectors. It will also increase the employment of our people. Once we have a company, it means there is job creation. Our people will benefit in terms of jobs, oil availability.”