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Illegal maize traders side-step security cordon to reach black market
ZimOnline
June 16, 2006

http://www.zimonline.co.za/headdetail.asp?ID=12292

MARIRANGWE - Forty-four year old Claudius Chityo braves the morning chill as he huddles along huge bags of maize grain along the dusty Nyamweda road in rural Mhondoro, about 100 km south of the capital Harare.

Chityo, waits patiently for buyers of the maize grain from Harare who normally prowl the rural area mopping up all the grain on offer for resale on the black-market in the capital.

Under Zimbabwean law, it is illegal to sell maize to private buyers as all the maize should be sold to the state-owned Grain Marketing Board (GMB).

But communal farmers in Mhondoro are defying the government ban on private maize sales saying it makes business sense to sell their maize quickly to private buyers who offer higher prices than the GMB.

"Prices change daily," says Chityo, hinting at Zimbabwe's run-away inflation which last May hit 1 193.5 percent.

"If I wait for the GMB to pay me at their own time, I will lose out. I would rather sell to buyers who pay cash on the spot that I can use while it still has value," he told ZimOnline along the road.

Zimbabwe's communal farmers, also feeling the pinch after six years of a severe economic crisis, many blame on President Robert Mugabe's controversial policies, are shunning the GMB as they sell their maize crop to private buyers.

The trend has raised fears that the government might fail to meet its target of harvesting 1.8 million tonnes of maize this season.

Agricultural experts say grain deliveries to GMB depots around the country have been "very poor and discouraging" mainly because of the country's atrocious road network and bureaucracy by the state grain company in paying farmers.

Communal farmers have to deliver their maize to GMB depots at their own cost compared to the "illegal" grain buyers who visit communal areas to collect the staple grain.

In Harare, Mufaro Tamandai, emerges from heaps of bags of maize on his shop verandah in the poor suburb of Budiriro. "I buy the grain from communal farmers desperate for ready cash," Tamandai says.

Tamandai is among individuals who go out in the rural areas and buy grain for resale in Harare, cashing in on the failure by the GMB to promptly pay farmers for grain delivered.

While the GMB is paying Z$31 million a tonne for maize, informal buyers like Tamandai are willing to fork out as much as Z$37 million for the same quantity of maize.

Two months after the harvest season began, agricultural experts say only a paltry tonnage has trickled into GMB depots across the country.

GMB chief executive officer, Rt Colonel Samuel Muvuti last week said the parastatal had so far received a paltry 5 000 tonnes of grain, way below the country's target of 1.8 million tonnes.

"We still expect more farmers to come forward with their grain when it has acceptable moisture content. They are busy drying their grain," he said.

But analysts say the poor grain deliveries to the GMB suggests that Zimbabwe's food shortages are, contrary to government's pronouncements, far from over.

Earlier this year, the United States-based Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWSNET) warned that Zimbabwe would continue to face food shortages despite above normal rains during the last agricultural season.

FEWSNET said contrary to government projections, Zimbabwe would only harvest between a million and 1.1 million tonnes of grain this season, leaving the country with a serious shortfall.

The Zimbabwe government has however ignored the warnings insisting the country will harvest enough to feed itself.

Agriculture Minister Joseph Made, who has been accused in the past of misrepresenting the country's food security situation, recently told a parliamentary committee on agriculture that the country will harvest 1.8 million tonnes of maize, equal to national annual consumption.

In a move that captured the clear panic in government circles, the Harare authorities stationed soldiers and police officers on roads leading into cities seizing maize from individuals.

But somehow - as is so often with Zimbabwe's cunning black-market traders - they are still able to slip through the security cordon carrying tonnes of maize they offload on the illegal but thriving black-market.

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