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I'll add this to my morning email.
Posted on 07/20/2002 8:01:54 AM PDT by Clive
Eddie Cross, the writer of the following article, has been intimately involved and has previously held very senior positions in the agricultural industry in Zimbabwe. His in-depth knowledge gives full credence to what he has to say about the government-created staple food shortage. It is common knowledge that Zimbabwe was once known as the food basket of Southern Africa. WEBMASTER
The Emerging Food Crisis
On the 23rd November 2001, the Grain Marketing Board had 93 000 tonnes of maize left in stock. Of this about 70 per cent (64 000 tonnes) was fit for human consumption. Sales from the GMB have been running at over 20 000 tonnes a week for the past two months. Technically therefore, today - the 19th of December, GMB stocks will be virtually exhausted.
In the past three weeks the standard product of the maize industry - roller meal as it is known, has been in very short supply in the south of the country with the shortages now manifest in the north. As commercial stocks run out, this shortage will become more and more serious and it can be expected that by mid January, the unthinkable will happen - Zimbabwe will run out of its staple food.
This has enormous implications - Zimbabwe needs a total supply of about 150,000 tonnes of maize a month. Two-thirds goes into production of roller meal and super refined meal and the balance goes as stock feed. Sight is often lost of the needs of the poultry, pig and dairy farmers who are very dependent on maize as a stock feed component. Failure to secure adequate supplies of raw maize will therefore threaten not only the basic welfare of 12 million people but also a very substantial proportion of the countries livestock industry.
Once a total stock out has occurred it is very difficult to get this essential product back into free supply throughout the country. Panic buying and hoarding as well as profiteering takes place and all of this serves to distort market forces and normal distribution channels. We have three months to go to the start of the new agricultural marketing season, but 7 months to go to the first real intake of maize from the current crop. Zimbabwe must therefore import up to 1 million tonnes of maize in the next 7 months to avoid starvation and widespread panic and disorder.
This raises a number of questions - how will this very large import programme be financed, how will such a volume be brought into the country, how will it be distributed and sold? The record of this administration in all of these respects is appalling. First they denied that there was a problem, then when they acknowledged the problem was real and appealed for help, they said that they would not allow the international donors to supply the food direct to the private sector or to affected communities. This demand froze all offers of aid before the process could even get under way. Now they have gone out to tender for 150 000 tonnes of maize, which the South Africans have been holding on to in anticipation. They then delay awarding the tender so long that it lapses and they have to start all over again - with prices having risen a third in the interim. Now they have actually done the unforgivable - they have allowed our stocks to run down to zero and we must face the possibility of real starvation on a scal
Even if sufficient maize was available in the region (and it is not) there is no way that we can get up to 5,000 tonnes into the country on a daily basis and then move it into distribution to ensure adequate supplies in all centers. The South Africans are geared to supplying maize only in bulk from silos and moved by road and rail. Zimbabwe has to move maize in both bulk and in bags and bulk maize has to therefore either be bagged off at the Ports or at South African silos and then moved by road and rail. They are not geared to handle such an exercise. This volume could be moved across the BBR to Bulawayo silos but would then have to be distributed to all parts of the country. Once maize has to be brought in by sea the problems multiply - Beira, Maputo, Port Elizabeth and East London ports would all have to be brought into play as Durban is already congested. Beira has very limited capacity and would probably only cope with the ongoing wheat import programme.
The Zimbabwe Railways are not coping at present with even coal movements to the north so how they would be able to cope with another 100,000 tonnes of bulk cargo a month is any ones guess. Even with regional traffic being at low levels, delays at the Beitbridge border are taking up to 10 days and this would render road transport completely uneconomic.
To compound these problems, price controls have seriously disrupted food markets and supply chains across the industry. Sugar, cooking oil, salt and many other products are now in short supply. These are basic necessities for every family and prices for these essential commodities in the informal sector are now as much as double those listed on price control schedules.
The outlook for this coming year is, if anything, worse than this year - the new marketing season will open with no stocks of any basic foods in the market. Farm production will be below that of the past season and in particular we are likely to see a sharp reduction in soybean output - essential for the vegetable oil market and livestock industry.
The MDC has been predicting this situation from the start of 2001 - we have consistently warned all stakeholders of this impending disaster. The solutions are to be found but will require that the government step back from its present stance on the use of food as a political campaign tool. Formally ask the international community for help and then allow the experts and the NGO's and private sector to get on with the job of feeding the people. Because of our own stupidity over the past two years, we now have no alternative if we are to avoid starvation and civil disorder.
E G Cross Secretary for Economic Affairs, the Movement for Democratic Change. Bulawayo. 19 December 2001.
Everything predicted in this article is happening.
The port of Biera has since become congested, mainly because of maize shortages in Mozambique and the rest of the region requiring import for their own needs.
Can the government be blamed for a drought?
Yes, it can.
It is the duty of a government in the late 20th century and early 21st century to insure food security, to take measures against droughts and floods, which are cyclical occurrances and can therefore be anticipated.]
It is the duty of a government to abstain from driving away farmers and shutting down farm production for ideological reasons, especially during adverse climate conditions.
And this drought is not as severe in the region as was the drought of 1992, which Zimbabwe's economy survived.
And this is a strange sort of drought in which the dams are full and the streams are running, mainly bvecause the violent disruption of agriculture meant that the water was not needed to irrigate the crops that did not get planted.
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I'll add this to my morning email.
This naive, liberal brained statement assumes the government cares about its people. It doesn't.
Hold onto your wallets--more taxes are coming! We will surely feed Zimbawe forever as Mugabe sails off to Switzerland to enjoy his ill-gotten billions. The remaining white farmers will be blamed and their lives are at stake. Will the US rescue them? Did we rescue the remaining blacks not killed in Ruanda?
Until that can be arranged, the people will starve, Mugabe will get richer. . .
The U.S. got jerked around with Somalia, went to help, my, my.
All international aid to North Korea goes to fat cats in Pyongyang.
Zimbabwe must be deloused first--or let Congress donate its pay raise.
Ari Ben-Menashe was one of those who, with Democrats in Congress ,concocted the "October Surprise" story to try to bring down Ronald Reagan. What Democrats in Congress said:
serious allegations have arisen that individuals associated with the political campaign of then-Presidential candidate Ronald Reagan entered into a secret agreement with representatives of the government of Iran. Allegedly, the agreement was to delay the release of United States hostages until after the Reagan administration took office in 1981, in exchange for subsequent arms sales to Iran. The alleged actions are reported to have included a third government, and third parties, in the promise, and actual sale, of weapons. While no conclusive evidence has yet emerged, both the seriousness of the allegations and the weight of the circumstantial information compel an effort to establish the facts. This is particularly so in light of the accusation that President George Bush and former high U.S. government officials were involved...
Now Ari Ben-Menashe has been caught stealing food from Zambia and Burma while on the payroll of Mugabe. There has to be a tie in to the DNC somewhere in this.
O'Neil gets it. Do you remember that film clip of him explaining to Bono that, yes, the people needed wells. But we had sent more than enough money to buy them all wells. He further said that we shouldn't send more money until we were assured that it would go for the right causes.
If this admin. can insist on seeing results for our largesse, they will have done more for Africa than every other admin. ever has.
Exactly. Maybe instead they could send some of "their" troops in Bosnia, currently up to no good?
There are some voices that just scream fraud.
Mr. Ari Ben-Menashe voice tells me I should not try to buy a used car from him.
Also, the government continued to deny until it was too late.
Even if all the maize needed were at the ports, the ports are clogged because of maize shortages in other SADC countries requiring imports by sea.
I am apprehensive that they will have to resort to triage.
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