The Sunday News
Farming Issues Mhlupheki Dube
THE birth of a new farmers’ union focusing on livestock development is a welcome and definitely timely intervention to the seemingly orphan sector in agriculture. I have previously lamented the one-size-fit-all approach to agricultural interventions resulting in livestock development receiving the shorter
end of the stick.
This has always been caused by the bunching together of all agricultural sectors and in the end a generic treatment is provided even where customised region and sector specific intervention is needed.
The intention of this instalment is not to water down the important job that has been done and continues to be done by other farmers’ unions but to amplify the indisputable need for a livestock farmers union.
This union in my view should be tasked with lobbying and promoting programmes that answer the enduring questions in the livestock sector.
Working with the relevant ministry and other critical stakeholders, the union should address nagging challenges in the livestock sector.
These include issues such as increasing the national herd for both beef and dairy animals.
It is a well-documented fact that the beef herd as well as dairy herd have declined tremendously over the years due to a myriad of factors.
The dairy herd is almost at its lowest with the effect of reducing the country into a net importer of dairy products.
We are importing around 70 percent of our dairy products and this is a challenge which the livestock sector needs to critically look at and come up with mechanism of taking the country out of this problem.
The beef herd needs growth not only in numbers but also in quality of animals.
It is time we start promoting other breeds that are compatible with our environmental and climatic conditions.
We cannot be reduced to a country of one breed, the Brahman. There are other breeds out there that can be promoted and perform just as well as Brahmans do.
This is the kind of work the union should champion, research and more research to inform breed improvement programmes.
This obviously transcends the scope of one player and hence the need to network and synergise with other stakeholders.
Addressing breeding challenges may answer issues around critical production parameters such as weaning weights, calving rates, milk yields and other such production indicators.
The union should also work towards addressing the age-old war between livestock buyers and livestock producers.
It is a public secret that farmers, especially the smallholder communal farmers are always complaining of getting a raw deal from buyers while buyers complain that farmers tend to price their animals with no regard of the prevailing market trends.
This is an area that needs to be addressed so that fair trade practices are adopted and farmers can produce knowing that they will be happy with the fruits of their labour.
The union should lobby for adequate policing and regulation of the sector by such bodies like the Agricultural Marketing Authority (AMA) so that sanity is brought into the sector, especially on the marketing aspect.
There are a lot of vultures prowling and feasting on hapless livestock farmers with impunity.
The union should also be a vanguard for farmers protecting them from scheming thieves who are using sugar coated and sweet sounding schemes which promises farmers benefits in terms of livestock but with predictable fraudulent results.
Many people have joined some subscription-based schemes at the promise of receiving cattle after a given timeframe and more often than not, all they receive is an overdose of misery when it dawns on them that they have been creamed off by thugs preying on their appetite for cattle.
The union can certainly do something in keeping farmers aware of genuine players and fraudsters.
Therefore all well-meaning livestock sector players and interests groups need to support the newly formed livestock union so that it can grow and be useful to the farmers and the country.
On a separate note, I have made reference to my mother uMaKhumalo of Mzola in Lupane in some of my articles. It is with a heavy heart that I inform followers of this column of her passing away in a road traffic accident and we laid her to rest on Thursday.
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