Zimpapers Logo

Edgar Vhera Agriculture Specialist Writer

COTTON farmers who have been anxiously waiting for their unsettled payments will have something to smile about with leading cotton contracting company, Cottco announcing that it will clear all outstanding outlays by end of this week.

Cottco acting Chief Accounting Officer Mr Munyaradzi Chikasha revealed this yesterday in the wake of concerns by some stakeholders over the delayed payments.

“Cottco will by end of this week clear all outstanding funds owed to the ecosystem of farmers, retailers, transporters and businesses.

“We have received enough funds to clear all our arrears as we plan for the upcoming cotton marketing season, which will start in the next months,” said Mr Chikasha.

Cottco has so far managed to pay 97 percent of the money owed to farmers for crop delivered to the company in the last two seasons.

The Government has been pushing for top industry buyers of various crops to honour their payments to farmers in time to ensure continued production of strategic crops.

Owners of business premises that are rented by Cottco as collection and distribution centres have also been complaining over non-payment.

Mr Chikasha said all these business premise owners will be paid their dues and accrued interest by end of the week.

Mr Chikasha applauded farmers for continued support in cotton production despite the late payments adding that they had since started negotiating payments for the upcoming season with their bankers.

The Government is promising timely payments to cotton farmers for the coming marketing season.

This season Cottco is expecting to receive increased seed cotton intake to surpass last season’s 46, 7 million kilogrammes, added Mr Chikasha.

At last year’s World Cotton Day, concern was raised by players from the clothing and textile sector that the quality of cotton was very low and the Government instituted a quality paying pricing model.

The Government set the pre-season seed cotton grade differential prices per kilogramme at US$0, 40 for grade D, US$0, 41 for grade C, US$0, 43 for grade B and US$0, 46 for grade A.

The quality of seed cotton has over the years been on the downside due to poor rainfall patterns, which led to the discoloration of fibres, leaf trash, weak or immature fibres, insect stains due to lack of adequate application of chemicals and lack of grade differential payments, which demotivated farmers to pre-grade their seed cotton.