Back to Index

ZIMBABWE: GMB defends its hold on maize stocks
IRIN News
January 26, 2004

http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=33736

Zimbabwe's state-owned Grain Marketing Board (GMB) on Monday said it was responding to the country's food emergency by distributing some of its 240,000 mt maize reserves acquired from local farmers, but wanted to avoid flooding the market and exhausting its stocks.

"It's not that we're holding onto the maize, it's being released ... [but] we need to be very cautious when releasing the maize so as not to flood the market," acting GMB chief executive, retired Lt-Col Samuel Muvhuti, told IRIN. "We've got to watch the stocks we have - we've got to have a buffer."

However, one aid worker accused the GMB of dragging its feet. "While the GMB is releasing some stock on the market, it's woefully inadequate. It falls far, far short of need."

With Zimbabwe in the middle of its pre-harvest hungry season, the humanitarian community has called on the government to urgently distribute what maize it has to ease shortages and help reduce food prices, especially in the urban areas.

"We are very concerned over the availability of food on the market at prices the majority of people can afford," World Food Programme (WFP) country director, Kevin Farrell, told a press briefing in Johannesburg last week.

"We have made a request to the government to release the food into the market," Farrell said. "There is currently a big shortage of food, and the prices at the moment are reflecting that."

WFP hopes to feed around 4.5 million of the most vulnerable Zimbabweans by March, distributing rations of around 55,000 mt of maize each month. However, well over six million - more than half the population - are estimated to be in need of food aid.

Rising prices have put households under intense pressure. While the government announced a fall in inflation for December from 620 percent to 599 percent, food prices have risen by 14 percent since November.

The GMB has a monopoly on the collection and sale of maize at an officially subsidised price, but most urban Zimbabweans are forced to access basic commodities on the far more expensive parallel market.

Muvhuti said the GMB had a countrywide network of monitors reporting on conditions, and "as soon as we feel there are areas where we need to pay urgent attention, we distribute". He acknowledged, however, that "information doesn't always get to us as quickly as it should".

The latest WFP regional update said there had been "no improvement" in the GMB's retail supplies to rural areas, and people in the countryside "have to walk long distances in search of maize".

In a good season Zimbabwean farmers were able to produce 2 to 3 million mt of maize, with national demand standing at about 1.8 million mt. "The fact that we only got 240,000 mt means that some areas are in dire straits, and have been for the past two to three years," Muvhuti said.

He said 240,000 mt was "far below" the 500,000 mt the GMB would have had in reserve "at any given time" before the last three consecutive years of food shortages.

Please credit www.kubatana.net if you make use of material from this website. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License unless stated otherwise.

TOP