84% E-voucher success cheers state

Tue, 09 Jan 2018 07:54:39 +0000

By IRVIN MUYUMBWA

GOVERNMENT says the E-Voucher system has scored an 84 per cent implementation success rate in the 2017/2018 farming season with 846, 000 farmers of the targeted 1 million reached so far.

And Agriculture Minister Dora Siliya said yesterday, that over 55, 000 hectares of land has so far been affected by the fall army worms with the most hit being Lusaka, Luapula and Eastern provinces.

Ms. Siliya however, admitted that the e-voucher process experienced challenges of late release of resources by government itself, late registration among farmers who did not have confidence in the system and one commercial bank finding difficulties to distribute to farmers.

“Generally, we have not had complaints on levels of stock in the country such as lack of fertiliser or seed,” Ms. Siliya said.

Ms. Siliya said K900 million has so far been released to the six commercial banks towards the E-Voucher programme with only K187 million left to be disbursed by the banks.

She said the ministry has so far done well in capturing the farmers on the programme but notes a challenge from them coming up with their own contributions of K400 with 90, 000 beneficiaries having not loaded their contributions.

Meanwhile, Ms. Siliya said Government has no intentions to see farmers fail following the outbreak of armyworms, as it is working towards combating the pests to avoid further spread.

“The armyworm is here to stay and it has affected almost all provinces in Zambia. We continue to remind our farmers that the E- Voucher cards gives them access to procure pesticides to combat armyworms to salvage their crops” Ms. Siliya said.