Southern African Countries Record Reduced Cereal Production in 2019

Namibia, Malawi and South Africa saw a decline in cereal production of about 65,000 metric tonnes compared to 2018, a report has shown.

These are preliminary findings under the crop production and vulnerability assessment report for Southern Africa, which was presented at the joint meeting of Southern African Development Community (SADC) ministers responsible for agriculture, food security and fisheries and aquaculture taking place in Windhoek, Namibia, on June 3rd 2019.

According to the report, the three countries recorded a total of 153,000 metric tonnes of cereal for the 2018 season and only 88,000 metric tonnes for 2019 crop season.

Xinhua

Drought causes massive reductions in Namibia cereal production

A large swathe of southern Africa experienced below-average rainfall in the 2014/15 summer cropping season, causing big drops in the yields of many staple and other crops.

A report released by the Namibian government indicates that communal areas of mostly small scale subsistence farming experienced maize production reductions of as much as 80% below average, and 73% below harvests for the 2013/2014 season. Even in areas of large scale commercial farming, the maize harvest showed a drop of 46% less than last season’s harvest and 12% below the average production.

The national coarse aggregate production (maize, millet, sorghum and wheat) is estimated at 67 800 tonnes, reflecting a substantial decrease in the harvest of about 46% below the average production and 49% lower than last season’s harvest. (...more)

 Even in normal times a large coastal desert and a generally hot, dry climate contribute to Namibia having among the world's lowest maize yields of less than half a tonne a hectare.

African Agriculture

Southern Africa region's cereal deficit

by Irene !Hoaës

The Southern African Development Community (SADC) region recorded a drop of about 7 percent in cereal production from 33.81 million tonnes in 2011 to 31.47 million tonnes in 2012.

However, according to a brief of the SADC agricultural desk issued in August, this is slightly up by 2 percent compared to the past five-year average (2007–2011) cereal production.

Most countries, at least ten of twelve countries with data, have recorded decreases in cereal production in 2012, ranging from 1 percent in South Africa to as high as 60 percent in Lesotho when compared to cereal production in 2011.

Only Namibia and Tanzania had increased harvests in 2012 compared to 2011.

The poor crop production performance in many member states in the 2011/12 agricultural season has seen the region experiencing a cereal deficit of about 5.55 million tonnes in the 2012/13 marketing year, compared to a cereal deficit of 0.21 million tonnes in the 2011/12 marketing year.

All SADC member states except Malawi, Tanzania and Zambia recorded overall cereal deficits. Zambia recorded a cereal surplus of 1.11 million tonnes followed by Malawi with 0.56 million tonnes and Tanzania with 0.19 million tonnes.

For the first time since the 2006/07 marketing year, the region has recorded a maize deficit, assessed at 0.64 million tonnes, as regional availability of 28.86 million tonnes fall short of regional requirement of 29.49 million tonnes.

The current deficit is significantly the opposite of a maize surplus of 3.41 million tonnes recorded during the 2011/12 marketing year.

All countries have recorded maize deficits in the 2012/13 marketing year except Malawi, South Africa, Tanzania and Zambia. The region also continues to register regional deficits in the other main cereal crops of wheat, rice, sorghum and millet.

full article...New Era

Morocco: 2012 cereal harvest to be less than 50% that of 2011

Poor rains in Morocco may mean that the country's cereal harvest for 2012 may be less than half the previous harvest, forcing greater reliance on imports.

Mohamed Badraoui, head of the National Institute for Agricultural Research, told Reuters that less than 4 million tonnes of cereals were expected to be harvested this year, compared to 8.4 million tonnes in 2011.

"This year will be very difficult for farming in Morocco ... It is the worst year as far as rainfalls are concerned since 2007, " Badraoui said.

He said the country's annual cereals consumption did not exceed 7 million tonnes.

Sugar cane and sugar beet production levels are also expected to decline this year because of poor rains. Morocco usually supplies about 30% of its own sugar requirement, the rest coming from imports which will rise this year.

African Agriculture 

Morocco sees higher grains harvest

Morocco expects its cereals harvest to reach 8.8 million tonnes this year, Agriculture Minister Aziz Akhennouch said, exceeding its level last year and the current budget's crop forecast.

In remarks carried by the official MAP news agency, Akhennouch said the forecast was valid "as of today" unless "exceptional" developments occur. He did not give a breakdown per cereal variety for the harvest forecast.

The current cereal-growing campaign was spared the damaging floods of 2010 and farmers are hoping for dry weather in the weeks that precede the start of the harvest in June.

Morocco's cereal harvest stood at 7.46 million tonnes last year, recording a 27 percent fall compared with a year earlier, due mainly to the impact of floods.

The 2011 budget, predicting an economic growth of 5 percent, was based on a cereals harvest of 7 million tonnes.

The state's High Planning Commission (HCP) last month said Morocco's economy would grow by 4.6 percent in 2011 based on what it described then as a "realistic" forecast of a cereals harvest of 7 million tonnes.

A harvest of 9 million tonnes will be needed to enable the North African country to post economic growth of 5.1 percent, it added. HCP estimated the $90 billion economy to have gained 3.3 percent in 2010 versus 4.9 percent in 2009.

Agriculture is the country's biggest employer, at nearly 35 percent its workforce, but the majority of cereal-planted areas are small properties owned by subsistence farmers.

Reuters

Tanzania brewery contracts small-scale farmers' groups to supply barley

by Namtasha Mgaya

Tanzania’s leading brewery, Tanzania Breweries Limited (TBL), is consolidating the local barley industry by arranging to purchase the cereal from 10 local farmers groups.

The firm has empowered small holder growers of malting barley in the Southern Highlands of the country by signing agreements for purchasing the raw material locally.

Limitations to barley growing is blamed on lack of modern farming techniques by the majority of local farmers, lack of appropriate technologies and basic farming equipment, acidic soils in the area that requires massive liming applications, and unreliable rainfall patterns particularly in the northern highlands.

These challenges have compelled the brewers to device a programme named Kilimo Saidiana, which has achieved a milestone towards increasing local procurement of malt by signing agreements with the 10 organized groups of small holder producers.

These organized groups of smallholders cultivate 3,917, are expected to produce and supply to TBL approximately 4,000 metric tons of malting barley starting the 2010/11 season. TBL requires 50,000 tonnes annually.

This is an initial step towards fulfilling the aims of TBL to produce as much as possible of its malting barley from smallholders in the country and thereby contribute to the eradication of poverty in the rural areas.

In conjunction with the Stanbic Bank, TBL has obtained a secured pre-financing facility to contracted barley farmers seeking working capital loans for operational expenses, with the loan deducted from the farmer's proceeds at delivery time.

TBL external affairs director Phocus Lasway said under the programme the firm will import less malting barley from international markets.

"You know the problem is not the availability of the product in the market, but if you have it locally you can maintain the price. At one time the price of malting barley went up from US$400 to US$1,200 per metric ton on account of a three-year long drought in Canada, Russia and China," he said.

When growers manage to grow efficiently four metric tons per acre the profit is relatively good, but it needs modern farming techniques, he explained.

The organized villages are in the districts of Kilolo, Mbozi, Makete, Iringa in Njombe, Mufindi where some 6000 individual farmers will be engaged in barley farming.

TBL officials say this is an initial outcome of a partnership between Kilimo Trust and TBL to organize viable groups of smallholder producers to undertake contract farming business.

Kilimo Trust is a non-profit organization dedicated to linking farmers across the East African Community (EAC) region, to profitable national, regional and global markets.

This linkage requires helping most small farmers to graduate to enterprise owners or agri-SMEs capable of utilizing market opportunities, executing contracts within value chains and attracting private sector commercial financing (credit and equity).

In Tanzania, Kilimo Trust is also in partnership with Agra and Stanbic Bank that established an agribusiness loan scheme to increase access of smallholder farmers and SMEs to commercial financing, and expand business relationships between large agribusinesses and smallholders.

Kilimo Trust CEO in East Africa, Prof. Nuhu Hatibu, said smallholder farmers are not investing to increase productivity and production, not because they do not know what to do --but because they do not have incentives to do it.

TBL managing director Robin Goetzsche says agriculture plays a vital role towards poverty reduction and this being the case, every effort must be taken in this sector to change the prevailing subsistence agriculture to modern commercial agriculture.

East African Business Week

Egypt seeking to grow cereals on African farmland

The Egyptian government is hoping to cultivate wheat and other cereals on fertile land in African countries to feed its growing population of over 80 million.

In early September it signed a deal with the Sudanese government to give Egyptian companies access to Sudanese farmland.

“Growing essential crops like wheat in other water-rich African countries where fertile land is in abundance is an important solution,” said Ayman Farid Abu Hadid, chairman of the state-run Agricultural Research Centre, which signed the deal on behalf of the Egyptian government. “Cultivating wheat in other African countries will reduce the cost of imports.”

According to some estimates, Egypt consumes about 14 million tons of wheat annually, but produces only 60 percent of that. The Egyptian wheat subsidy system has been coming under strain in recent months and Egypt has been further affected by the Russian wheat export ban: it used to be a major importer of Russian wheat.

The government said in August it had plans to achieve 70 percent self-sufficiency in wheat by 2017. Agriculture Minister Amin Abaza said for Egypt to produce enough wheat to feed its population, it needed to increase the area planted to about 2.1 million hectares - from 1.26 million hectares at present.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has previously warned of the effects of rising wheat prices on budgets in North African countries.

Abdolreza Abbassian, FAO’s senior economist, said in countries where governments depended on bread subsidies to prevent social unrest, declining wheat output and increasing prices could have serious ramifications.

“Some are politically unstable countries, and they simply cannot afford social unrest due to costlier bread,” said Abbassian. “Wheat is a large part of the diet. It would greatly impact the urban poor, so they will be very careful,” he told the media in August.

The Egyptian private sector, which in the case of Sudan will be allowed to cultivate 420,000 hectares, will take the lead in boosting cereal farming in other African countries.

Saad Nassar, an adviser to the Egyptian agriculture minister, said the deal would allow Egyptian companies to grow a variety of crops in Sudan’s well-irrigated Al-Gezira region south of Khartoum, and that the Egyptian government’s role would be restricted to offering the necessary technical assistance.

Egyptian officials say African and Nile basin countries, such as Uganda, Rwanda, Kenya, and Ethiopia, are high on a government list as potential places in which to make agricultural investments. They add that, apart from strengthening links with these African countries, the move would help Egypt avoid depending on its limited water resources.

“Water scarcity is Egypt’s main hindrance to even coming close to food self-sufficiency,” said Abdel Salam Gomaa, a leading agricultural expert. “It is a fact that stifles every attempt to attain self-sufficiency.”

A recent market report says Egypt would need 86 billion cubic metres of water annually by 2017 (up from the 55 billion it currently gets from the Nile), but a recent government-commissioned report said Egypt would only gain access to 70 billion cubic metres of water annually by then.

Although they enthusiastically support the government initiative, Gomaa and like-minded experts warn against depending too heavily on the generosity of other African countries when it comes to water.

Any moves, they say, might confirm the worst fears of decision-makers in Nile basin countries that Egypt is out to grab as much water as it can for itself. “This is a real dilemma,” Gomaa said. “These countries are so sensitive to any talk about their share of the water of the Nile, particularly when it comes to Egypt.”

Several upstream countries recently began lobbying for a redistribution of water from the Nile. These countries say two colonial era agreements - signed in 1929 and 1959 - unjustly give Egypt and Sudan too much water, leaving their own populations high and dry.


IRIN

South African bumper harvest depresses Botswana cereal prices

by Mbongeni Mguni

A three-million tonne surplus in maize from South Africa has resulted in a depression of prices local farmers are able to obtain for their supplies to the Botswana Agricultural Marketing Board (BAMB), it has been learnt.

According to BAMB officials, South Africa is expecting 12.96 million metric tonnes of maize this year against local demand of nine million in that country. The region's agricultural giant also has carryover stock amounting to 1.9 million tonnes, further weighing on the already surfeit market.

With BAMB benchmarking its price on the South African maize price, what is music to the ears of local consumers has become a nightmare for local farmers.

While last year, BAMB was buying maize from farmers for about P70 per 50-kilogramme bag, this year the price has dropped to P60. The surplus also extends to sorghum, with this year's prices dropping to P55 from last year's P82.50.


BAMB Public Relations Officer, Boipuso Nyatshane, says market forces are pushing cereal prices down this year, to the detriment of farmers. "The prices are very low due to the surplus from the massive harvest in South Africa," she says.
"They have a lot of produce, three million tonnes of which has been set aside for the export market. We benchmark our prices on South Africa which also benchmarks against Chicago. If South Africa has excess produce, it means prices will be low. This in turn means the prices we can offer our farmers will be low."


Defending the rationale of benchmarking against South Africa, Nyatshane says as a net importer of food and a comparatively small market, Botswana cannot afford to set its own commodity prices.


"Many times farmers will complain that our prices are low, but if we sell higher than South Africa, the millers will go there," says Nyatshane. "We have to keep our prices competitive in relation to South Africa. Farmers now know how the system and the market work."


South African farmers are receiving between R1 050 and R1 200 (between R52 and R60 per bag) a tonne of maize while the BAMB is offering farmers P1 200 per tonne of maize, or P60 per 50-kilogramme bag. "We offer this slightly better price in order to support the local industry," Nyatshane says. "We cannot afford to go too much higher though. The difference with South Africa is also transport costs, which is in a way an incentive. We are trying to support the industry."


Botswana's sorghum price of P55 per bag is also higher than South Africa which generally decides on the price by trimming five percent off the maize price.

Nyatshane points out that sorghum receives special attention in terms of pricing because BAMB is eager to support it, the cereal being the staple food for most households in Botswana. She says without the support, farmers would be discouraged from planting sorghum and focus on maize instead, thus creating shortage of the staple cereal.


Nyatshane urges farmers to liaise with BAMB in various fora in order to avoid the effects of low prices. "We always give farmers market forecasts during the pre-harvest season so that they know what to plant," she says. "Many farmers have planted maize when South Africa has a surplus and when everyone does this, prices go down. "In addition, we encourage them to sign contracts with BAMB. For example, those holding contracts with us will this year receive P85 per bag of sorghum, which is the price we agreed before planting. With contracts, if the price goes higher than agreed, we will pay you the higher price. If it goes lower, we will still pay the agreed price."


Last year, maize and sorghum farmers signed contracts worth 18 000 tonnes with BAMB, a figure that has risen to 38 000 tonnes this year. This year's figure consists of 33 000 tonnes of sorghum, with maize bringing up the balance.
BAMB purchases commodities between April and September, selling these to millers and other offtakers throughout the year.

Mmegi

Poor storage threatens cereal harvest in Benin

Benin's cereal production is expected to be 45 percent higher than last year, but poor storage ruins an estimated 40 percent of the annual harvest, according to UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

"The same effort we are putting into production is not going into conservation," said Benin's FAO representative, Jean Prosper Koyo. "It is not enough to just produce, but the surplus needs to be stockpiled." He added: “Storage is important so that products can be processed here. We cannot export all of the raw production."

While FAO and the USAID-funded famine early warning system (FEWSNET) project cereal production declines of an average 30 percent in neighbouring Chad, Niger and Mauritania due to insufficient rains, they have predicted as of November an estimated 45-percent – or 600-ton – increase in Benin's 2009 harvest over last year's.

The next biggest increase according to FAO is in Ghana with an expected 44 percent more production than last year; the biggest drop is in Chad with an estimated 34-percent reduction.

FAO’s Koyo said FAO is financing the pilot construction of metal silos for small producers as well as three large warehouses throughout Benin for medium to large producers.

Another cause of post-harvest crop losses is farmers’ use of natural sunlight to dry their cereals pre-storage, Koyo said. “Sun is the not the best way to dry harvests. When it is done incorrectly, we expose the harvest to parasites."


IRIN

Research promises end to aflatoxin contamination and reduction in global trade losses

by Godwin Atser

Researchers at the Ibadan-based International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, the African Agricultural Technology Foundation, Kenya, and the United States Department for Agriculture have demonstrated the ability of natural Nigerian fungi to reduce the concentrations of aflatoxins in maize and, as a result, reduce global trade losses estimated at $1.2bn.

The researchers through a partnership have created a safe natural biological method of eliminating aflatoxin contamination of food crops, IITA says.
Aflatoxins are chemical poisons produced mainly by the fungus Aspergillus flavus in maize, groundnuts, cassava, and yam chips. These toxins are also potent causes of cancer and suppress the immune system causing humans and animals to be more susceptible to diseases.

Besides, aflatoxins are also non-tariff barriers to international trade since agricultural products that have more than permissible levels of contamination are rejected in the global market.

Though losses faced by the global economy are estimated at $1.2bn, African economies lose about $450m annually to aflatoxin contamination.

Aflatoxin is a silent killer. It undermines human health and stunts the growth of children but is not often visible on the corn when purchased. says Dr. Ranajit Bandyopadhyay, IITA Pathologist at a meeting organized by the AATF in collaboration with IITA. The meeting, which ended on Friday, examined the prospects of a biological method for drastically reducing aflatoxin contamination.

On-station field trials of the biocontrol method in Zaria, Ikenne, Mokwa and Ibadan showed 50 to 99% reductions in aflatoxin contamination of maize.

Under the biocontrol, native strains of Aspergillus flavus that do not produce aflatoxins (called atoxigenic strains) can be applied in order to alter the fungal community on crops and throughout an area so that maize becomes less contaminated with aflatoxins. When applied appropriately, these native atoxigenic strains competitively exclude aflatoxin producers.

This competitive exclusion principle of biological control will be used as a new type of aflatoxin intervention strategy to mitigate the negative effect of aflatoxins on human health and trade in Kenya and Nigeria.

Dr. Peter Cotty of the Agricultural Research Service, United States Department of Agriculture, who collaborated with IITA on the project, says natural populations of Aspergillus flavus consist of toxigenic strains that produce copious amounts of aflatoxin and atoxigenic strains that lack this capacity. He explains that competitive exclusion works by applying selected native atoxigenic strains to out-compete and exclude aflatoxin-producers during colonization of grains and thereby reducing levels of aflatoxin contamination. There are several atoxigenic strains native to Nigeria that are useful for reducing aflatoxins.

Bandyopadhyay says atoxigenic strains can be directed at reducing aflatoxin contamination in several crops throughout an area simultaneously.

Manipulation of the composition of fungal communities (i.e., replacing high aflatoxin-producers with their cousins that do not produce aflatoxins) so that high aflatoxin-producers are less common, is a viable approach for reducing aflatoxin contamination throughout all crops grown in a target area, he says.

According to Bandyopadhyay, atoxigenic strains for use in biocontrol have been identified for use in Kenya and Nigeria by USDA-ARS and IITA. On April 24th a group of stakeholders including farmers, government officials, the food and feed industry and NGOs expressed the desire to convert this technology into the reality of a readily available product for producing safer maize in Nigeria where this technology will be used for the first time in Africa.

Modern Ghana

Burkina Faso has bumper grain harvest, but marketing decisions cause shortages, high prices

by Brahima Ouédraogo

Looking worried, Hadja Mamounata Belegda, commercial grain farmer, rubs the beads of her rosary between her fingers and ponders the consequences of grain shortages on the market in Burkina Faso.

"In previous years I would have had 4,000 - 5,000 tonnes of grain in my warehouses but this year (2008-2009), I did not even have 1,000 tonnes in my four warehouses," she laments. Belegda explains that as soon as the bumper harvest of the 2008-2009 agricultural season was announced, traders from neighbouring countries rushed to Burkina Faso to purchase grain.

Thanks to good rainfall and a grant input from the Burkina Faso government, cereal production for 2008-2009 reached more than 4.2 million tonnes - a surplus of 717,000 tonnes.

"We expected prices would go down, but we were caught off guard and now see that prices will continue to rise," laments Belegda. According to her, rather than cereals being imported from elsewhere as usual, this year they are being exported to Ghana, Mali and the Ivory Coast.

The trend is confirmed by Green Africa, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) specialising in information on grain prices in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger. The Ouagadougou-based NGO said in its January report that the scarcity of grain on the market led to a price increase of 14 percent for millet and 20 percent for sorghum and maize.

"The bag of maize which cost 7,500 CFA francs (about $15) on our markets in November, has quickly risen to 12,000 CFA francs in December and 15,000 CFA francs in January, following strong demand for the cereal from Ghana." This is according to Joseph Dagano Moussa, President of the Federation of Agricultural Professional Producers of Sissili (FEPACI), in the mid-west of the Sahelian West African country.

According to Green Africa, the scarcity of grain, despite an exceptional harvest, is mainly linked to the renewing of stocks by producers and traders in deficit areas. Furthermore, traders are already busy stockpiling. The NGO adds that this heavy demand impacts on grain prices and availability.

The NGO says the situation remains worrying, even though some observers predict a drop in prices, given that much of the grain producers' stock is not yet on the market - especially in surplus areas. Green Africa adds that as an additional measure, farmers in production areas are for now selling peanuts, sesame and beans; all of which were also produced in abundance this year.

To encourage farmers to put their produce on the market, members of the Burkinabé government met with producers and traders in the second week of January in the capital Ouagadougou.

The Minister of Agriculture, Water and Fisheries, Laurent Sédogo, who attended the meeting, says, "There are urgent measures to be taken and awareness needs to be raised because this meeting with the traders and producers helped us understand that there is some reluctance from producers, who need to feel trusted."

According to Sédogo, the government will renew production subsidies granted to producers for the past season.

"We will go to producers and reassure them, put our trust in them and encourage them so that they make their grain available to retailers," says Sédogo. He stresses that, amongst other things, the grants will be renewed this year (2009-2010) so as to produce sufficient grain, as was the case in the previous season.

"I feel reassured because this year I must collect 30,000 tonnes of cereals (maize and sorghum) and I think there will be a surge of patriotism that will see us supplying our people with this stock before we bring out other cereals," says Charles Sawadogo, director-general of the National Agency for the Management of Food Security Reserves, a public company.

Last year, to help the most needy populations cope with soaring prices, the government took 30,000 tonnes of grain from its security stocks, which it sold at a discounted price of about $18 for a 100 kg bag.

However, Sawadogo remains concerned about the market price: "We buy at a certain price to be able to resell at a discounted price, hence when we buy too expensively, not only does this give us insufficient stock, but we then sell at a significant loss."

According to Soumaila Cissé, president of the Interprofessional Committee for the Cereal Sector, an interface between producers and traders, the government should have undertaken consultations with stakeholders at the end of the agricultural season to prevent the export of several thousand tons of cereals.

"This dialogue is good because it's not about pointing fingers at each other; it's about everyone being aware of their responsibilities," says Cisse, whose organisation has less than 200 tonnes in its warehouses yet usually has 3,000 - 6,000 tonnes of collected grain at this time of year.

Mamadou Sanou, the Burkinabé Minister for Trade, Entrepreneurship, Arts and Crafts, says, "We will maintain contact at all times, we will work with them in a spirit of mutual understanding, consensus and problem-solving. But as for robust solutions, we are not there yet. If prices continue to rise, we could have a repeat of last year's violence, when we instead want peace in the country iif we are to develop as a people," Sanou stresses to producers.

According to Bassiaka Dao, president of the Farmers Federation of Burkina Faso (CPF), it is particularly important to subsidise agriculture for several years to ensure food self-sufficiency and the wellbeing of producers.

He explains, "To avoid problems, the government should agree to buy the surplus and sell it at an acceptable price on the market so that producers can, at the end of each season, look after themselves and put their children in school - through their work."

The increase in grain prices has already led to similar meetings being held between the different stakeholders in the cities of Bobo-Dioulasso and Koudougou, in the west and midwestern parts of Burkina Faso.

IPS

Senegalese celebration of farming initiative may be premature

Six months after President Abdoulaye Wade launched his agricultural growth initiative, small-scale farmers had mixed reviews even as the President on 27 October celebrated the initiative, touting record harvests for 2008.

The Grand Agricultural Offensive for Food Security, or GOANA, was launched by President Wade in May 2008, with the aim of reaching self-sufficiency in Senegal's food production by 2015. Doubling rice production, and increasing maize and manioc yields to two million and three million tonnes respectively, is one part of the scheme.

Senegal imports 600,000 tonnes of rice a year, or three-quarters of the country’s food consumption, making its people vulnerable to high global rice prices.

Under GOANA the government subsidised seeds by 75 percent to 20 US cents per kilogram, and cut the price of fertiliser in half, making it $US17 for per 50kg.

Six months into GOANA, the Ministry of Agriculture predicts a harvest of 1.8 million tonnes of cereal, a 136 percent increase over last year’s yields. The government estimates yields of over 700,000 tonnes of millet, 500,000 tonnes of maize and 380,000 tons of non-irrigated rice in 2008.

At the 27 October event, thousands of supporters, farmers and members of agricultural organisations gathered opposite the presidential palace in the capital Dakar to showcase their produce. Farmers displayed peanuts, fonio, rice, millet, bananas and vegetables.

President Wade said to the crowd, “The GOANA results show that we have resources. If we’d had help from external donors, we could have done more… But you have achieved record harvests compared to last year. This means that one must always be self-reliant.”

Several factors contributed to the good 2008 harvest, said Oumar Samba Ndiaye, director of production at the government Market Regulation Agency. “The number of seeds and fertilisers distributed, the amount of rain and pest levels contributed to this year’s yield,” he said.

Senegal saw good rains in 2008 compared to a late, short rainy season in 2007.

But Boubacar Cissé, spokesperson for the National Council for Rural Cooperation and Consultation -- a non-profit organisation representing small-scale farmers -- said that not all of the seeds distributed through GOANA arrived in time to plant, and some were of low quality.

“We find it difficult to take this [136 percent figure] at face value. Not all of the seeds distributed were sown, and not all of the fertiliser was used. For one hectare, you need at least 150kg of seeds. But small farmers cannot buy this amount of grain, even at subsidised prices. Opportunists are cashing in instead by buying the reduced-cost seeds through farmers, and then selling it at higher market prices.”

As a result, not all of the small-scale farmers for whom the subsidies were intended have been able to plant seeds, Cissé said.

Three small-scale farmers from different regions of Senegal were interviewed about their experience growing crops post-GOANA.

Aliou Camara, from Kolda region, 335km south of Dakar, produces fonio.

"With the lack of fertilisers and the jump in rice prices, things were really difficult at the beginning of the year. People were eating the seeds instead of planting them because they were hungry.

"GOANA is excellent because the small farmers are now able to produce on a larger scale. This year we produced 50 hectares of fonio, whereas before we were just producing for our families. The year before we didn’t even bother to count how many hectares we produced.

"Senegalese like to eat fonio because it contains no sugar, good for diabetics, and it’s rich in nutrients. But the problem with it is that converting it into food takes time if you don’t have machines. It takes us more than a week to process five hectares of fonio. We need machines if we are going to develop fonio production further."

Adama Ndao, from Tambacounda, 420km east of Dakar, is secretary general of regional banana producers group.

“In Tambacounda we produce 95 percent of Senegal’s bananas. We had enormous difficulties earlier in the year, most of all regarding our marketing and sales. We had 1,000 tons of bananas in the production zone that we could not sell. We had difficulty with traders and people buying bananas on credit, because they didn’t have enough money.

“We are still experiencing problems with these supply chains. That is part of the reason that we are here at this event – to show our gratitude for the President’s initiative but also to explain our problems.

“It’s difficult to transport our product to market, so it is hard to sell. We sell to the local [Senegalese] market, but at the moment it is not profitable because we produce, but then are not able to sell our products.”

Abdou Salamy Barry, Casamance region, 450km south of Dakar, grows maize, millet, rice and beans

“For a long time many families here lived on the brink of starvation before the first crops are harvested in early September. We eat rice mostly and the price of a 50kg sack has doubled, so no father can assure his family’s food needs.

“We have not felt the effects of GOANA in this zone. We haven’t received any material from the government, nor any subsidies. Seeds arrived in August, halfway through the rainy season. So we just did what we could with our own seeds.

“The tractors, promised by the government, have not been distributed to the farmers so we planted with our normal hoes. We haven’t really profited enough from the rainy season. Many fields have been cleared but not cultivated.

“We are expecting high yields but this is a result of the good rains throughout the country, not of GOANA. And this doesn’t mean that people here are food secure. The amount harvested allows us to cover some of our food needs, but we will continue to buy rice and other cereals in the shops.

“If the government wants the people to achieve food self-sufficiency in Casamance, [the government] must equip small-scale farmers with modern agricultural materials. Above all, they must consider irrigated farming and not just farming that relies on rainy seasons.

“The good rains are often not on time. It is utopian to think that we can achieve self-sufficiency relying only on the rain.”

IRIN

Tiny fonio cereal may hold big answers in food crisis

Despite growing for centuries in some of the driest, toughest agricultural zones of West Africa, the fonio cereal has been neglected by most agricultural development programmes, according to the World Bank. But skyrocketing rice price increases that have slammed rice-dependent West Africa and declining profits in other cash crops like cotton have some local producers turning back to the ancient cereal.

But Olivier Durand with the World Bank in Mali said fonio has some hurdles to clear before reaching store shelves: “Its main drawback is the very difficult post-harvest process, as it is a very small grain. There's a market for pre-cooked fonio, but prices are still pretty high due to the low productive post-harvest process.”

The average cost for a 1-kg package of pre-cooked fonio is US$2, twice as much as raw fonio, according to the US-funded Economic Growth Programme, which is trying to revive fonio production in Senegal. This price is about as twice as expensive as one kilo of the more commonly-consumed, but less protein-packed, rice.

The UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) estimates an annual production of about 250,000 tons of fonio grown on 380,000 hectares of land in lead-producing country Guinea, followed by Nigeria, Mali, Burkina Faso and Ivory Coast.

But producers in other countries are trying to get in.

In Senegal, the mostly female cooperative, Yakaar Niani Wulli [the hope of villages Niani and Wulli, in the national Wolof language] of small-scale farmers in southern Senegal has been trying to plant and sell fonio.

The cereal fell out of vogue when families had more money to buy rice imports, said organic food biochemist Malik N’diaye with the Senegalese non-profit Environment, Development Action in the Third World (ENDA).

Because of its smaller-than-couscous size, de-husking and cleaning can take up to five poundings, an estimated one hour to mill less than 2kg. Fonio evokes rural images of a woman standing over a mortar pounding the seeds with sand, and then – sometimes unsuccessfully – separating sand from the grains.

But the World Bank’s Durand said relief is on the way: “New techniques will improve the productivity while reducing the work hardship for women.” He added the food crisis may give overlooked cereals like fonio more attention. “My fear with fashion and ‘revivals,’ he said, “[is] that one will consider this is one [and only] solution, the key revolution and miracle, [but it is]…one among other solutions to the food security issue.”

FAO reports rice prices quadrupling worldwide in the past two years. In West Africa, only Burkina Faso is a cereal exporter, according to the 2008 Global Hunger Index, which stated hunger levels are higher in sub-Saharan Africa than anywhere else in the world.

ENDA’s Ndiaye told IRIN this is the same area where fonio freely grows: “Fonio can grow in arid zones, a plus for the drought and famine-prone Sahel.”

Finding a market

In 2007, the US-based Economic Growth Programme facilitated a tasting event of organic fonio in Koussanar, the Senegalese rural birthplace of the cereal located about 400km east of the capital Dakar. An American export company bought two tons of the pre-cooked fonio cereal from the federation, which was the federation’s lone export last year.

The production group is expected to harvest 20 tons from 60 hectares in 2008, with 10 tons to be sold and the other half reserved for local consumption.

The federation of about 2,000 members is trying to buy a husking machine to make their work quicker and to increase production, according to ENDA.

ENDA’S N’diaye told IRIN the time has come for people both in and out of West Africa to rethink the cereal: “It may be arcane because it has been around for so long, but it has medicinal properties able to fight diabetes, which has sparked recent interest.”

According to the French agricultural research centre working for international development (CIRAD), fonio is an amino-packed, easily digestible, easy-to-grow desert food.

N’diaye said locally, fonio is known mostly as the first dish a newlywed wife is required to cook for her husband. But it could be much more, he said: “It should also be known as a nutritious, protein-packed organic speciality good. It is old, but also new.”

IRIN

Alfatoxin levels affect Ghanaian cereals exports

The Ministry of food and Agriculture has expressed concern about the level at which some exported Ghanaian food crops, particularly cereals, are rejected on the international market because of aflatoxin infections.

The Chief Director of the Ministry, Dr. Gyiele Nurah, who expressed the sentiment said several complaints have been received on the poor quality of food exports, a situation he attributed to lack of appropriate equipment to process the food items for export. Hementioned lack of labour to harvest the crops on time, inadequate and inappropriate methods of harvesting and preservation to meet quality standards of the international market.

Nurah called on agricultural engineers to help find solutions to these problems. He said to help address food production problems in the country government has since 2004 imported tractors and other inputs for agricultural purposes. He said government has also established Mechanization Service centres across the country to improve farmers access to mechanization services.

The President of the Ghana Society of Agricultural Engineers, Daniel Lamptey stressed that until Ghanaians see farming as serious business and not something for illiterates, not much can be achieved in the area of food production. He explained that irrigation and mechanization which are needed for improved agricultural growth must be understood and practiced well so as to derive their benefits.

Mr. Lamptey said a situation where one extension officer is in charge of about 100 farmers is not conducive for the kind of growth the country expects.

GBC

Uganda's export of raw cereal contributes to animal feed shortage

Uganda’s continued export of unprocessed cereals is partly to blame for the current shortage of animal feeds in the country. Most cereals, especially maize, are exported as unprocessed consequently there are no residual byproducts that can be used to manufacture animal feeds.

Some animal farmers now want a law to be passed to enforce value addition on all cereals so that byproducts can be used to manufacture animal feeds.

“After several meetings and consultations the Animal feed bill was drafted and tabled to the 7th Parliament, unfortunately nothing happened. We humbly beg you to take up this matter expeditiously,” the Chairman Poultry Association of Uganda (PAU) Mr Aga Sekalala.
He was speaking to Agriculture minister Onek.

If the bill is enacted, one of the pertinent issues it will address is to enforce exportation of value added maize so that the residue are used in the manufacturing of animal and birds feeds.

Currently Uganda and the feeds industry is experiencing an acute shortage of raw materials and the escalating commodity prices have forced many poultry farmers to sell their birds before maturity and others could be pushed out of business.

All the maize exported within the region is in its raw form something which has constrained the feeds industry from accessing raw materials. Other possible sources of raw materials include fish products, cotton and sunflower seed cake, bones, cassava and sweet potatoes. Kenya and Tanzania have a policy that instructs their farmers to export only value added maize thus leaving the residue for their domestic feeds industries.

“We have written to the Director General of NARO requesting his help to begin trials for yellow maize and cassava trials at both Magigye Farm and Namulonge Research Station in order to find long-term solutions on raw materials for animal and poultry feeds,” Ms Immaculate Mgulumi from PAU said.

The farmers have also asked the government to facilitate training activities for farmers in handling their business. “We are aware that government of Netherlands offers Uganda government Scholarships each year; The ministry must intervene to avail those scholarships to poultry farmers,” Mr Sekalal

Monitor

ICRISAT makes gains against Striga with new genetic technique

Agricultural researchers have successfully identified and transferred genes that confer resistance to Africa’s most deadly weed (Striga) using the novel marker assisted selection technique successfully for the first time in the history of crop breeding in Africa.

Researchers have managed to confer resistance to Striga in sorghum, overcoming a barrier that has for decades held back scientists’efforts to protect key food crops - sorghum, millet, maize and rice, from this destructive weed. These crops are primary food sources for 300 million people across sub-Saharan Africa.

Striga (Striga hermonthica), also known as witchweed, destroys between 40 to 100 percent of a complete season’s crop, its annual crop damage across Africa estimated at seven billion dollars (US$7 billion). Currently, the weed threatens to wipe out cereal crops in most of Western Kenya and Eastern Uganda, national agricultural research institutes in the two countries have warned.

“Scientists have searched for the solution to Striga damage using a variety of methods, but without much success,” says Dr Dionysious Kiambi, a molecular geneticist with the International Crops Research Institute for Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT). “Through marker assisted selection, we have determined the precise segments of the sorghum genome known to confer Striga-resistance and have transferred them to farmer-preferred varieties through conventional breeding with very promising results.”

Marker assisted selection is a new technique which entails use of genetic landmarks (markers) to tag and transfer specific genes or group of genes that control characteristics of interest such as improved crop productivity, resistance to diseases or pests, or tolerance to stresses like floods and drought. This is the first time the technology has been used successfully for crop improvement in Africa.



ICRISAT scientists has been working with national and international collaborators for several years experimenting with marker assisted selection in search for Striga resistance genes from other sorghum varieties conserved in gene-banks across the world. They found one sorghum variety (N13), that is neither high-yielding nor drought-tolerant, to possess the highly sought after Striga-resistance genes.

Segments of the N13 sorghum DNA containing genes for Striga-resistance were tagged with markers and crossed with farmer varieties using conventional breeding. The use of markers enabled scientists to precisely transfer only the Striga- resistance genes to farmer-preferred sorghum varieties without jeopardising farmer-desired characteristics such as drought-tolerance and higher yields.

“We had to make sure that other genetic information from N13 was not transferred to farmer varieties alongside the qualitative trait loci with Striga-resistance. We were not replacing any genetic components of farmer varieties, we are just adding to it,” says Dr Kiambi. “The resulting variety is almost identical to the original farmer variety plus the component that confers Striga resistance.”

ICRISAT has been collaborating with scientists from the University of Hohenheim in Germany and national agricultural research institutes of Eritrea, Kenya, Mali and Sudan. The team has to date created five Striga-resistant sorghum varieties whose initial trials on-station have been able to ward off Striga attacks, some as effectively as the donor parent, sorghum N13. In Kenya, Mali and Sudan, scientists are currently testing the new witchweed-resistant varieties in farmer fields.

Researchers in Africa have for decades experimented with a number of “potentially successful” techniques for managing this deathly weed including breeding for Striga tolerance in various crops, promotion of rotational cropping of cereals with legumes such as groundnuts, cowpeas and soybean in order to break the weed’s breeding circle, as well as the use of biological and herbicidal control methods.

Africa’s resource-poor farmers manage Striga primarily by weeding, a pointless, back-breaking activity which comes too late. By the time the crop sprouts, the weed, whose seeds reside in the soil, has long-since attached to plant roots and begun sapping off plant nutrients in earnest. Striga is a prolific seed producer, whose seeds lie dormant in the soil for up to two decades.

Crop breeders are enthusiastic about marker assisted breeding because it significantly reduces the duration required to produce improved crop. While conventional breeding is a hit-or-miss technique that requires scientists to wait for the crops to grow to maturity in order to observe expression of desired traits like Striga-resistance, marker assisted breeding enables scientists to check for the transfer of the trait as early as when the plant is only two weeks old, and focus on plants with the desired trait. This has more than halved the amount of time crop breeders need to develop improved varieties.

If the on-station results are successfully replicated on-farm, Africa’s biggest cereal crop menace – Striga - may well be reigned in, boosting agricultural production, food security and farmer incomes across the continent.

www.icrisat.org

Poor 2008 cereals harvest feared in East Africa

An expected poor 2008 cereal crop yield in several East African countries is set to exacerbate food insecurity for millions of people affected by high food prices, a UN agency warned July 15.

With harvesting underway or due soon to start, the Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia, Uganda and Kenya all faced low crop production for the 2008 main season.

While the important March-May rains improved towards the end of the period, cumulative totals remain below normal in large areas of Ethiopia, Somalia, parts of western Kenya and in the Karamoja region of Uganda, FAO said.

The situation is particularly dire in Somalia, where the main cereal crop, due for harvest from August, is largely anticipated to be a failure as a result of a late start and poor performance of the rains in most parts of the country.

Crops in many southern areas had already wilted and dried by the end of May and although light rains in early June led to a replenishment of water resources, they arrived too late to benefit the crop, FAO said.

The failure of the 2008 main crop, which follows two below-average seasons, has resulted in a 'critical food supply position,' FAO said.

'The humanitarian situation is rapidly deteriorating due to a combination of increasing food prices, a significant devaluation of the Somali shilling, disruption of internal markets and internal trade, and mounting civil insecurity,' the UN agency said.

FAO estimates that currently 2.6 million people are in need of assistance, or about one-third of Somalia's total population - an increase of more than 40 per cent since January 2008.

M & C

Algeria struggles to regain its wheat farming prowess

High world grain prices should make this a golden age for Algerian wheat farmers, but a legacy of mismanagement means the former Mediterranean farming superpower is struggling to regain its lost agricultural glory.

Erratic rainfall is a perennial threat and weeks of drought this year will likely hit cereals output in a country that is already one of Africa's top food importers. But it is administrative and policy flaws that pose the bigger menace, say farmers. They complain of a lack of financial support despite well-intentioned government efforts to reverse a history of neglect and a debilitating reliance on oil and gas in the north African country.

Farming provides work for around 25 percent of those of working age in the 33 million-strong population, and accounts for about 10 percent of the Opec member's $110-billion gross domestic product. But agricultural productivity is low, with Algeria harvesting less wheat than Egypt on three times as much land.

Farmer Achour Slimani stands in a parched wheat field of stunted plantings and echoes a complaint common among his peers."The banks refuse to provide loans to farmers. They support importers and industrialists, but never farmers," said Slimani, part-owner of a 134-hectare (330-acre) field in Ouled Yellis near Setif town at the centre of the main wheat plains."You can't build agriculture without an efficient banking system," he said.

In a major policy speech in February, President Abdelaziz Bouteflika said Algeria should devote more land to food, including cereals, more land should be irrigated and greater efforts made to prevent desertification. But he did not directly address one of the main constraints cited by cereals farmers - access to loans. Inflexible credit means farmers cannot invest and banks often cite lack of title as a reason to refuse loans, farmers say.

The issue is critical because 62 percent of farmed land is private smallholdings where farmers usually lack title to the assets that would qualify as collateral, official figures show. The remainder is state land, managed in many cases by private farmers under long-term concessions."We have cultivated wheat since the Romans, but a majority of farmers don't have title to property," said Lahcene Lamri, secretary general of the Setif chamber of agriculture.

For decades, farmers tilling some of Africa's richest land were the pillars of Algeria's economy and, at independence from France, accounted for 63 percent of export revenues. But the departure of the French in 1962 triggered a decline, with the loss of foreign managers and skilled labour compounded by the advent of a command economy featuring fixed salaries for farmers and effective state ownership of farms. Hydrocarbons took over as the economy's mainstay and the government began to favour heavy industry over farming, a humiliating reversal for a sector with a proud history as a regional breadbasket dating back to Roman times.

Today, energy accounts for more than 95 percent of export earnings. Farming suffered further damage in the 1990s when political violence triggered an exodus to the cities by rural families fleeing fighting between the army and Islamist armed groups. As a result Algeria, one of the biggest purchasers of wheat on the international market, imports around 5 million tons of cereals annually to fill shortfalls in the domestic crop, forking out $1,5-billion per year for foreign-grown cereals. Algeria's productivity is below that of its neighbours, harvesting 4.3 million tons of cereals in 2007 on cultivable cereals land of 3 million hectares, official figures show. In comparison, Egypt produced more than 7 million tons in 2007 on just 1.1 million hectares, and Morocco harvested 9 million tons on 5.5 million hectares in 2006.

Cereals farmers say heavy bureaucracy, bad quality of seed corns and expensive pesticides hinder their work. To be recognised as a farmer, individuals have to lodge a request with the local chamber of agriculture, which can take months to issue the official card that allows them to do business. Since many farmers are illiterate, navigating the paperwork is a challenge, as is dealing with banks, which can also require extensive form-filling.

But improvements in other sectors, such as fruit and vegetables, show farming is far from a lost cause.Since 2001 vegetable, wine and date output has grown and provided new jobs. In April, the government indicated the time had come to give a boost to cereals output, announcing it would buy some local wheat at prices close to those in the international markets.

Implementation, however, has been patchy."Speech is one thing, and reality is another thing. To be included in the government plan, you must own a large surface area. The problem is that 80 percent of wheat lands are less than five hectares," agriculture analyst Lyes Kahouadji said. Farmers must own at least 10 hectares to be considered for the price support, he added.

Messaoud Benouari, chairman of the Setif chamber of agriculture, said, "Nothing has come yet from the capital Algiers. How and when will this decision be enforced? We don't know."

IOL

More doubts cast on Senegalese plans for dramatic agricultural gains

If the new agricultural programme announced by the Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade succeeds, it will be one of the greatest agricultural and economic revolutions in post colonial Africa.

President Wade, who now wants his country to become a self-sufficient and major food producer, has named the initiative the "Great Offensive for Food and Abundance" or Goana.

The objective is to re-launch a decaying agricultural sector to ensure food security for all mostly through a boost in local production, while at the same time finding a solution to soaring food prices in world markets, which have caused hunger riots in this West African nation and other parts of the world.

Criticising the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation and some NGOs, which according to the Senegalese ruler only use Africa's plight and food insecurity situation for their own benefit, Wade has called on his fellow country people to rely first on their own efforts and potential.

For a country which has been importing most of its staple food (rice) since independence and where the agricultural sector is totally down with the country relying on erratic rainfall patterns, implementing the Goana may sound too ambitious.

"Senegal, to the light of our experience, has decided to meet the challenge and not only dismiss any risk of hunger or famine, but also go further and produce in abundance," says the president whose target is to produce as early as this year, 500,000 tons of rice or 2.5 times more than the current local production.

Senegal's annual rice consumption has risen to 800,000 tons per year, of which 80 percent (600,000 tonnes) is imported, mainly from Asia. Some call this phenomenon the "rice dictatorship" because of the huge negative impact of this commodity on Senegalese consumption habits as well as on their economy.

President Wade has also pledged to liberate his country from this dependence on rice with his new initiative, by increasing to two million tonnes the local production of other cereals such as millet which is grown in the eastern part of the country. He has also targeted an increase in meat and dairy products.

If the ideas all sound generous and great, the big problem is that the current trends are not very encouraging.

For rice, for instance, figures obtained from the Senegalese Ministry of Agriculture, reveal that the objective of 215,000 tonnes set for the 2007/2008 campaign was not reached. The total production was a little more than 193, 000 tonnes leaving a 16 percent gap between the expectations and the final outcome.

For the same period, equally significant deficits were noted for all other cereals combined with the official figures showing an average deficit of 13 percent on all cereals. Against this background, it will be a Herculean task for the country's farmers to produce more within such short notice.

The call by the president was directed not only to the known farmers but to everyone in the country -- including his ministers, senate members and MPs to be the first on the list of new peasants and to farm, each, at least a 20-hectare plot.

"It is possible to meet those targets," Ababacar Diouf, an agronomist at the ministry of agriculture says, indicating that the country has "the human resources, the water resources and the necessary land," to launch and succeed in this green revolution.

However, Diouf maintains the targets require commitment and serious work which he doubts all his countrymen are capable of. One other obstacle he foresees is that the Senegalese generally look down upon farmers and farming activities, which he says has to change. "Here being a farmer means being poor and miserable, now that the political will is here, these things may also change," an enthusiastic Diouf adds.

Not everybody shares his enthusiasm. "Increasing the agricultural production has been a topic discussed several times since the change of government (in 2000). There has been lots of talk, but few results," says Aziz Badji the leader of a farmer's association in Ziguinchor, in the south of the country.

Mr Badji, who is a rice producer, agrees that the human resources are available, but highlights many other hurdles that need to be cleared in order to have an efficient agricultural system and to reach the ambitious goals contained in the Goana programme, such as making sufficient seeds and fertilisers available, having control on water resources and access to equipment for farmers.

But the president has ready-made solutions: Water will be realised through "provoked" rains while seeds, fertilisers and equipment will be provided through support from local businesses and foreign partners, from whom he has requested a "sincere" form of aid and partnership.

However, critics are taking a dim view.

"All this sounds amateurish, it will be another failure because the decision has been taken unilaterally without talking to the actors and experts", says opposition leader Ousmane Tanor Dieng.

But for the president, who said he has ordered his government to purchase two airplanes to "provoke the rains" there's no doubt his speech will mark the beginning of a new era.

Surprisingly, President Wade doesn't indicate the connection between the Goana plan and another major initiative he initiated and launched years ago, which was also aimed at boosting the nation's agriculture and alleviate the conditions that are pushing young Senegalese into making illegal and deadly trips to Europe by sea in small rickety boats.

This other plan called REVA ("retour vers l'agriculture", or return to agriculture) was meant to persuade the young people to become farmers to improve the country's agriculture and help fight poverty.

That the president did not say what the connection was between REVA and the new initiative, leave alone making any reference to the previous programme, had many thinking that REVA was dead and buried, or at least forgotten as many other grand projects have been before.

The Daily Monitor

Armyworm threatens cereal crops in Zimbabwe

Over 600 hectares of cereal crop, including maize, are under threat in Zimbabwe following an outbreak of armyworm, the Plant Protection Unit has said.

The unit’s head, Dr Godfrey Chikwenhere, said the devastating pest was discovered last week in maize, sorghum and pasture fields in various parts of three provinces. He said the unit had since dispatched teams to the affected provinces to contain and monitor the situation.

"We have deployed teams in the three provinces and we are still to get a detailed report on the extent of the damage. But we can safely say we have managed to contain the situation," Chikwenhere said. He said the unit would soon give a detailed report on the situation countrywide once teams on the ground submitted their reports.

Armyworm thrives in the wet conditions of summer when the ground is moist and the vegetation lush. The devastating caterpillar can cause great damage to crops in the grass family such as maize, sorghum and millet. More than 30 000ha of cereal crops, including maize, have been destroyed in past seasons following armyworm outbreaks.

The Herald