LIVINGSTONE MARUFU
Zimbabwe’s private sector is targeting to utilise 25 000 hectares under wheat this winter season amid indications are that the country might suffer wheat supply constraints due to the Russia -Ukraine war.
The bulk of the Zimbabwe’s wheat supplies come from Eastern Europe due to the weather conditions which produce the best wheat in the world.
The wheat winter season started on April 1 but Zimbabwe is yet to plant meaningful hectares due to the late harvesting of summer crops and funding.
The National Wheat Contract Farming Committee vice chairperson Graeme Murdoch told Business Times that late rains have affected wheat planting as most farmers were yet to harvest their summer season crops.
“Planting is underway. We are expecting the private sector to plant 25 000 hectares of wheat and barley this year and the hectarage will be one of the biggest in recent years,” Murdoch said.
The government is planning to increase wheat’s hectarage to 75000 from above 60 000 last year in a bid to achieve self-sufficiency.
The Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development Ministry has roped in tobacco farmers to put 20 000 hectares under wheat this year to help the growing of the winter following the Eastern Europe conflict.
“We want to expand the wheat hectare to 75000 where we want to attain self-sufficiency of 380 000 tonnes of wheat with tobacco farmers expected to put 20 000 hectares under wheat with an estimated output of 100 000 tonnes,” Lands minister Anxious Masuka recently said.
He said Zimbabwe has sufficient fertilisers for winter wheat farming and efforts are also being made to guarantee fertiliser supplies for the next summer season.
“The transition to winter wheat by tobacco farmers is a welcome move and will go a long way in boosting supply of the cereal so that we have sufficient domestic stocks.
“We have a Tobacco Working Group comprising all stakeholders which meets regularly to interrogate pertinent industry-wide issues. I hope I can appeal to this group and all farmers to assist government’s in its quest for wheat self-sufficiency by ensuring that the 20 000ha grown to irrigated tobacco can be put to wheat. This could generate 100 000metric tonnes of wheat, which is 26% of national requirement,” Masuka said.
Zimbabwe’s national wheat requirement stands at 360 000 tonnes of wheat and with the aforementioned projected output the country will have an extra 20 000tonnes of wheat.
However, even if the country was to achieve the national requirements it still needs to import wheat to make good quality bread as local wheat cannot make good quality bread due to conditions in which the wheat is grown under.
Hence Zimbabwe has to import a small percentage of wheat to blend the cereal with local wheat to make good bread.
Zimbabwe can export its own to get foreign currency to use on other critical raw materials.
The local wheat is good at manufacturing biscuits and other things.
