Concerns over possible maize shortage

Zimbabwe's Grain Marketing Board (GMB) has received about 119,000 mt of maize, out of an expected 1.2 million mt since the beginning of the marketing season in April, the official newspaper, the Herald reported on Wednesday. The newspaper quoted GMB's acting chief executive Winston Dzawo as saying that the parastatal had been receiving about 30,000 mt of maize every week and deliveries were expected to reach a peak in the middle of this month. The Zimbabwean government has since the beginning of this year forecast a bumper harvest of over two million mt for the staple maize. However, other analysts have consistently warned the crop is likely to be well below national demand, estimated at 1.8 million mt. Reacting to the newspaper report, Pierre-Luc Vanhaeverbeke of the European Union's food security division in Harare expressed concern that "if by the beginning of August, the board has only received 119,000 mt of maize, how will the country meet the shortfall?" Zambia's Food Reserve Agency told IRIN last month that it had received export queries from Zimbabwe. Other food relief agencies have expressed concern over whether the GMB has the logistical capacity to receive 30,000 mt of maize every week. The Herald also reported that the board has been paying cash upfront to farmers who delivered maize. "The parastatal [GMB] had by mid-last month paid farmers $40 billion [about US $7 million] out of the $100 billion [about US $18 million] released by the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe to purchase grain," the newspaper said.