By SANDRA MACHIMA
The Zambian Agriculture and Rural Development Initiative (ZARDI) has called for aggressive sensitisation among farmers on the need to venture into various farming activities for export purposes.
ZARDI executive director Gilbert Mpanga said it was through diversification that the country be able to boost the economy that was facing challenges, following the global threat of covid-19.
Mr Mpanga said it was imperative that the agriculture sector was widely supported to attract more people into farming.
Zambia can still make it, he said, if only farming was regarded as priority and ensured it exported produce was exported products.
He said local farmers were capable of feeding the nation if they received massive support from relevant stakeholders, he stated.
Mr Mpanga said local farmers should be empowered and motivated so that they increased their productivity.
He said there was also need to intensify sensitisation on the dangers of deadly and fast spreading covid-19 epidemics in farming communities.
“We further encouraged farmers to adhere to safety measures put in place by the Ministry of Health so as to stay safe to this deadly covid-19.
“Farmers are our major players in national food security, and must protect themselves from unnecessary groupings until the environment is conducive,” he said.
He said despite such challenges, Zambia was anticipating a bumper harvest as a recovery from the dry spell of 2018-2019 farming season which saw Zambia have little harvest.
ZARDI urges boost in agriculture
