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| National |
| Subsidy programme facing problems |
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by
Joseph Langa, 26 November 2005
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03:04:17
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Unscrupulous estate owners and traders in various parts of the country are buying the subsidised fertiliser in bulk using corruptly obtained coupons as deprived poor farmers wait on queues for weeks for the commodity which is in short supply in most Admarc depots.
In Kasungu, the District’s Development Committee ( DDC) last week confiscated 600 bags bought corruptly from T/A Simlemba’s area, District Commissioner Kiswell Dakamau said on Monday. The fertiliser was then sold to smallholder farmers from the same area and the money given back to the traders.
Another 28 bags were confiscated from traders at Benga in Salima on their way to Nkhotakota, according to Salima District Commissioner Gift Rapozo.
In Chiradzulu, Police on Thursday arrested a 32-year old man for being found in possession of 37 bags of fertiliser believed to have been bought at subsidised fertiliser using coupons that are being distributed by government.
The man, Levison Chisanu, who hails from Chiwaya Village, T/A Mpando in Ntcheu, confessed he bought the coupons from farmers in Mulanje.
Interviews with some smallholder farmers in Kasungu on Monday revealed that some had spent several weeks at National Smallholder Farmers Fertiliser Revolving Fund of Malawi (SFFRFM) depot, waiting to buy the subsidised fertiliser. Some of the desperate people were forced to use some money meant for fertiliser on food.
Tokoma Phiri and Yelemiah Saka both of Mbiya village, T/A Kaomba in Kasungu said on Monday they still had not been able to buy the fertiliser after spending two weeks on the queue.
The District Commissioner and T/A Kaphaizi, who regularly witness the sale of fertiliser at SFFRFM depot, the only selling point where fertiliser is readily available in the district, confirmed some farmers spend weeks waiting for the fertiliser.
Dakamau said people sleep on the veranda of the SFFRFM depot, risking loss of their coupons and fertiliser through theft.
He said there are only two selling points in the whole district and people travel over 60 km to try their luck at the boma. The DC feared this would affect the programme as farmers use some of their money on food and to pay vendors who organised themselves to buy fertiliser on behalf of farmers at a fee of up to K500.
When Weekend Nation visited the depot around midnight last Sunday, hundreds of farmers were sleeping on the khonde of the depot while those who had already bought the commodity sat or were sleeping on their bags inside a nearby motel.
District Commissioners for Mzimba, Salima, Ntcheu and Zomba, SFFRFM and Admarc officials revealed that the problem of congestion is countrywide.
DC for Mzimba Richard Hara, his Zomba counterpart Paul Hara, an Admarc official from Ntcheu and Rapozo all said most Admarc depots in their districts have run out of fertiliser resulting in congestion in the few selling points where fertiliser is available.
Rapozo said the congestion has forced some of the farmers to exchange their coupons with money or maize, which he also feared, will affect the programme’s intended goal which was to help poor farmers access fertiliser.
SFFRFM Operations Manager, Bizwick Chinguwo, Admarc Operations Manager, Denis Maluwa and Coordinator of the programme Alex Namaona all said the programme is facing various problems, including congestion, but they claimed everything will be put under control.
Chinguwo said the cause of the problem is that government liberalised the sale of fertiliser at district level, which allows farmers from any part of the district to buy at any selling point in that district.
“Initially fertiliser was supposed to be sold at EPA (Agriculture Extension Planning Area) level for easy monitoring but later government liberalised the sale to allow people to buy the fertiliser at any selling point within their districts,” he said.
“This means that a coupon from Kasungu is valid at any selling point in the district. This has forced farmers to rush to the boma where fertiliser is available and cause serious congestion because Admarc has run out of the commodity in most of their depots,” added Chinguwo.
Namaona said government decided to liberalise after some districts had messed up the original system to the extent that it was difficult to follow it. But he concurred with the view that liberalisation made control of the programme difficult as people could steal coupons from one part of the district and use them in another district.
He said his office had received reports mainly from Kasungu about vendors and traders swindling farmers and civilian police officers were deployed to help put the situation under control. |
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