Africa-Press – Tanzania. NKASI District has temporarily stopped National Food Reserve Agency (NRFA) from purchasing maize to avert chaos since the amount offered to farmers is just a drop of water into the sea.
The District Commissioner, Mr Peter Lijualikali Nkasi, issued the directive to NRFA as they offered to buy merely 300 tonnes which was a token compared to the district maize output.
The DC urged that the order stick until the meeting to sort out the amount to be purchased since 300 tonnes is a child joke as could be met by a single farmer.
“This will bring confusion when the purchasing starts…and we don’t want that to not occur.
“Equally we have many single farmers in the district who have harvested between 2,000 (200) and 4,000 sacks (400tonnes) of maize,” Mr Lijualikali said at a small town of Namanyere yesterday.
The food agency allocation of the district was too low and also for the entire Rukwa region of 2,500 tonnes of maize. “The allocation is too low as here in district [Nkasi] there is one local investor who has more than 600,000 tonnes,” the DC said.
Earlier, NFRA Sumbawanga Zone Manager Marwa Range said that they have planned to purchase 3,500 tonnes due financial constraints but the target is to buy 35,000 tonnes.
“The purchasing exercise will be conducted at Mazwi center here in municipality, Laela and Mtowisa in Sumbawanga District Council. “ Also Namanyere center in Nkasi and Mwimbi in Kalambo District in Rukwa Region but Katavi Region has only one purchasing center located at Kibaoni’ he said.
The NFRA announcement last week pushed up prices of maize by three times and spews a fresh breath of good hope for farmers who were selling their produce at throw away prices. The NFRA maize purchasing season took off at the beginning of the week.
The news pushed up retail prices of maize in Rukwa abruptly from 20,000/- to 60,000/- per a sack weighing 100kgs.
