Agriculture Minister Rugare Gumbo says Zimbabwe has potential to regain breadbasket status. Of course, we do. Potential is enough. Zambia has potential too. Regaining the breadbasket status is the hard part.
Anyway, according to newspaper reports, 95% of the entire crop planted in Matabeleland South for this season is a write off. (pause…95%) Compound that with this: Government need to import 400 000 tonnes of mealie-meal this year alone to cover up for disaster in the fields.
Zimbabweans used to have droughts before the Agrarian reforms. It is nothing new but at least the droughts were not back-breaking. We almost used to have a good plan B in the form of food reserves. What is new is the harshness of these droughts and their frequency. (Which reminds me, Tazzen Mandizvidza once claimed on national TV that the Americans were messing with our weather systems to fix the government. Was not that such a silly thing to say?
So what does this latest crop failure mean for Zimbabwe? Well, it’s all bad news:
· If aid is not forthcoming, there will be a famine in most parts of Zimbabwe. People and livestock will die of hunger and this will exacerbate our already dire situation.
· Inflation will sky rocket. The government will have to ‘manufacture’ funds to buy grain to feed a starving and restless nation. I estimate that the government will need to come up with at least US$230million for food imports alone. This figure is based on the government’s appeal to humanitarian agencies.
· There will be a general shortage of mealie-meal. (speculators’ dream)
I guess it never rains but pours for Zimbabwe. (Excuse the pun). If the government survives this year, it would be a miracle to rival any.
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1 comments:
we always underestimate Mugabe's ability to survive
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