The Sunday News
Mhlupheki Dube
THE cash shortages the country is facing call for pragmatic and innovation solutions to deal with the situation.
It is no secret that the cash shortages are here to stay until maybe the time when bond notes are released and accepted by the market.
Consequently the anxiety gripping the majority of citizens has seen the greenback vanishing from the formal channels as people make some panic withdrawals.
Having said that, it should be noted that people need to cooperate with the monetary authorities and try out the raft of measures that have been proposed to deal with the situation. Digging in and going west while authorities suggest east can only make our situation worse and the worst victims of the situation are none other than the very ordinary members of society who may not have the right connections.
It is in this regard that this pen calls for players in the beef value chain to start looking at ways of going around the cash problems to keep the business going. Readers may want to know that due to the prevailing cash shortages, buyers are finding it hard to pay for the cattle and consequently a lot of cattle auctions are being cancelled because buyers could not get enough cash to warrant a sale.
Now the cancellation or postponement are not a solution to a problem which is likely to be with us for a while before normalcy returns. Other options need to be adopted especially informed by the measures suggested by the monetary authorities.
One such measure is the use of plastic money or electronic transactions which do not involve actually handling cash.
During discussions with colleagues on the use of plastic money in livestock marketing, you get a myriad of reasons why it cannot be done when all we need is a reason why it should be done. It is the latter which could help farmers not the former.
So, I implore all players involved in this industry to invest their energies on how and why it needs to be done.
Players such as businesspeople in rural areas especially around cattle sale points need to start putting measures to make them able to receive payments for goods using money transfers. This will mean a farmer can then be able to sell his animal at an auction centre at community level, receive payment through transfer to his phone and then go to the next business centre to purchase grocery items.
I am very much alive to the fact that there are other areas with no mobile reception and a good number of livestock farmers without cellphones but at least it can work in other areas. It should be appreciated that while others are struggling to withdraw money from banks, similarly farmers are now struggling to withdraw from their bank (livestock) and hence we need solutions, not moaning and groaning.
Our extension services should assist to disseminate information on use of plastic money to both local businesspeople and farmers. It is obviously a mindset change issue which takes time and protracted education. Extension officers meet farmers regularly than most stakeholders and hence can be useful in carrying the message to the farmers.
It must be borne in mind that as people look for assets to convert to cash, both cattle farmers and cattle owners look to their livestock as a solution to their cash problems and hence an exit point simply has to be found.
Farmers are already burdened with a lot impediments in the industry, chief among them the FMD-induced embargo and hence any solution which can ease the pain should be welcome and supported. Uyabonga umntakaMaKhumalo.
