By AARON CHIYANZO
THE ruling Patriotic Front (PF) should participate in winter maize farming to ensure a steady supply of maize on the market which will in turn stabilize mealie meal prices, a PF official Lemmy Bwalya has said.
Mr Bwalya said as the party in power, PF should ensure that Government policy implementation was supported.
He said in an interview that the party could participate in farming on a large scale after sourcing for funding from sponsors.
Mr Bwalya said PF had the manpower from several volunteers who would be engaged to kick start the farming programme.
He said if the party could offload enough maize with other players, it would stabilize prices of mealie meal.
Mr Bwalya pointed out that in China and several other well to do countries, political parties in power supplemented Government efforts by driving several policy pronouncements such as farming.
He said with the way Government and President Edgar Lungu were promoting fish farming in Zambia, the ruling party would have had several ponds and leading in the activity.
Mr Bwalya said agriculture was the fastest machinery to economic development, saying it was time to take the diversification agenda seriously.
“It’s time that we stopped being unprofitable to the party and Government and become genuine officials through sacrifice. As a visionary leader, I’m pleading with the party president to empower us with a commercial land with all it takes, so that, we can prove our leadership, through creating employment and contributing to the economy.
“A lot has been said about economic development. But I want everyone to know that, during ancient time, development was driven by agriculture as Woodrow Wilson’s put it. Before any system was used, agriculture was considered to be the fastest machinery in economic development,” he said.
Mr Bwalya called on all PF members to volunteer and make themselves available once the party leadership adopted the idea of venturing into agriculture.
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