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Elita Chikwati Senior Agriculture Reporter
The Agricultural Marketing Authority(AMA) is conducting farmer field schools for cotton production and other crops across the country to promote good agronomic practices to improve crop quality.

The farmer field schools will run from March to May from March 21 to end of May.

This exercise  complements Government’s initiatives aimed at boosting agricultural productivity and profitability such as Pfumvudza/Intwasa and Small Holder Irrigation Schemes Revitalization Programme.

The training programme is targeting 10 000 farmers throughout the year.

The first phase will see 4 800 farmers receiving face-to-face training while others will be trained virtually.

Farmers will be trained on cotton marketing, grading and contamination while others will receive training of horticulture crops on irrigation schemes.

AMA is partnering with fertilizer manufacturers and seed houses including Windmill, ZFC, FSG and Quton as well as chemical suppliers Agricura and Cure Chem to be partners for the training programme.

AMA CEO Mr Clever Isaya said technical guidance was of paramount importance in crop production.

“It is through training that farmers are able to grow for family consumption and earn more from selling surplus harvest. Remember, the Government’s mantra is that agriculture should be treated as a business.

“Thus, adoption of best practices will improve agricultural output and accelerate attainment of upper middle income economy status by 2030,”he said.