Africa-Press – Botswana. At this year’s installment of the Ghanzi show, President Dr Mokgweetsi Masisi demonstrated confidence in the exceptional quality of animals produced by Mr Toy Katjiova by purchasing small-stock from the 27-year-old farmer.
The purchase included a total of eight animals, consisting of two Boer goats priced at P50 000, two Kalahari Red does for P40 000, and two Boer goats does for P40000.
Additionally, President Masisi acquired a Veld Master ram for P25 000 and a Veld Master ewe for P15 000, amounting to a total of P170 000 from the young farmer based in the Charleshill area.
When making the purchase recntly, President Masisi commended Mr Katjiova for producing good quality small-stock and encouraged him to continue being exemplary particularly to youthful farmers.
He encouraged the farmer to stay the course and protect his business especially in the face of the looming drought, saying adherence to good livestock management practices or the lack thereof would determine whether or not individual farmers would survive the drought.
On Friday when officially opening the show, President Masisi said the country was expecting one of the worst droughts to ever hit it and noted that the drought was expected to have devastating effects on the livestock sector.
He urged farmers to play their part in protecting the sector by adopting and implementing good livestock management practices, and explained that government had, in response to the impending challenge, rolled out a number of household food security relief measures to cushion households and farmers against the effects of the drought.
“These interventions include among others, the provision of subsidised animal feeds for all livestock species, borehole equipment as well as provision of vaccines,” he said.
In the same breath, Dr Masisi cautioned businesses supplying the commodities covered by the government drought mitigation measures to desist from unethical and unfair business practices of escalating prices exponentially.
Minister of Agriculture Mr Fidelis Molao advised livestock farmers to consider disposing off some of their animals to raise capital with which they would use to care for remaining ones during the drought period. Such a move he said, would up farmers’ chance of surviving the drought as it would help them protect their herds from being entirely wiped out by famine.
Ghanzi show committee chairperson Mr Thuso Mackenzie said in an interview that the drought would affect farmers in different ways.
He said while most farmers who participated in the show were commercial farmers with the capacity to feed their herds, total lack of natural pastures would compel them to spend more on feeds than they would ordinarily do.
Mr Mackenzie said it would not be surprising to record a decline in the quality of animals brought for exhibition in next year’s edition of the Ghanzi show.
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