Surplus maize available for export

Zambia is expected to have a surplus of at least 300,000 mt of maize this season, based on projected production figures, a senior government official told IRIN.

After a failed harvest in 2002, which left an estimated 2.3 million in need of food aid, Zambia has recorded a bumper crop and is set to export some of its surplus maize.

The operations director of the state-run Food Reserve Agency (FRA), Charles Chabala, said Zambia had put in a tender to supply neighbouring Malawi with 25,000 mt of maize at between US $160 to $180 per mt.

Chabala said the FRA had also received export queries from other countries in the region. "We are expecting delegations from Zimbabwe and South Africa," he said.

Zambia was one of the few countries in Southern Africa that received adequate rains, and was able to provide small-scale farmers with seeds and fertiliser on time for the planting season. Minister of Agriculture Mundia Sikatana told IRIN that he was expecting a good harvest, "but we are still awaiting the final crop assessment figures".

Despite localised food insecurity in the south of the country, Zambia sold about 120,000 mt of maize last year, a substantial portion of which was supplied to Zimbabwe through the World Food Programme (WFP), Sikatana said.

Zambia produced 1.2 million mt of maize during the 2002/03 farming season - double the tonnage of the previous year.