WHEAT PRICES GO UP

Fri, 27 Oct 2017 09:28:15 +0000

By Oscar Malipenga

WHEAT farmers have hiked the price of wheat to US$420 from US$370 per ton, meaning the price of bread and other wheat products will soon increase as well.

Millers Association of Zambia (MAZ) president Andrew Chintala confirmed the development to the Daily Nation yesterday.

Currently, wheat farmers are selling their commodity between US$380 to US$420 compared to US$360 to US$370 last season.

Mr Chintala said wheat farmers decided to increase because of the 75 percent increase in electricity tariffs as almost all the farmers were using irrigation system to grow the crop.

Meanwhile, Mr Chintala said MAZ requested the government through the Ministry of Agriculture to ban the importation of the commodity because the farmers were still harvesting and that the demand for wheat locally had not increased.

“There are no imports currently, we requested government to stop the importation, the last importation was the first week of September,” Mr Chintala said.

He said farmers and officers from the Ministry of Agriculture were analysing how much wheat has been produced this season. Mr Chintala appealed to wheat farmers to quickly sign contracts with the millers to properly plan for the season.

Zambia Wheat Growers chairman Donald Burton said the hike was triggered by the 75 percent increase in electricity tariffs, as well as an increase in the price of other inputs.

“Wheat growers are importing fertiliser and chemicals from South Africa and electricity has also gone up,” Mr Burton said.

Zambia consumes an average of 540 000 tons of wheat per annum, but last season experienced a deficit of 250 000 tons. Millers had to import 150 000 tons as a stop-gap measure. The imports were halted a week ago when the harvest of the new crop started.