Concerns about food shortages

Bread shortages could be on the horizon in Zimbabwe after the decision by some large milling companies to ration flour supplies to bakers, the ‘Financial Gazette’ said on Thursday. The newspaper quoted milling and baking industry sources saying that supplies had been cut by between 15 and 40 percent because of shortages of locally grown wheat and the high cost of importing supplies to meet the shortfall.

“Currently one miller (Blue Ribbon) is rationing flour,” National Bakers Association chairman Mark Prior was quoted saying. “The largest miller (National Foods) is currently considering rationing but has yet to introduce rationing of flour.

The major reason for the introduction of rationing is the shortage of wheat supplies in the country. Not all the millers are affected, but the major mill has a shortage of stock.”

Industry executives said the government’s decision not to assist the private sector with wheat imports, forcing millers to resort to the parallel market, would force flour prices up in the next few months, resulting in “astronomical” bread prices at a time when consumers could be facing serious shortages. Bakers said bread shortages were inevitable if flour rationing by large millers continued because smaller millers could not meet the shortfall left by bigger companies.

“The smaller mills have just sufficient (stocks) to see them through to the next harvest at current off-take levels. They cannot accommodate new customers or increased off-take,” Prior said.

On Tuesday, Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe denied that the country would face food shortages, and said the country would import maize if there was a shortfall. “We have done well in agriculture, except in regard to one crop, maize,” he said.

Maize is the staple grain used to make a thick porridge which serves as the main source of starch for Zimbabweans.

His ministers of finance and agriculture, as well as the government’s agriculture monitoring system, have agreed with the warnings of a looming shortfall.