Zimpapers Logo

Elita Chikwati Senior Agriculture Reporter

Wheat deliveries to the GMB have reached 181 527 tonnes with the daily in-take averaging 5 000 tonnes.

Harvesting has intensified as some farmers want to plant summer crops while others want to remove the wheat before it is damaged by early rains.

Agritex director, Mr Stancilae Tapererwa confirmed that harvesting was affected by recent rains in some parts of the country.

“To date, 71.5 percent of the area planted (47 521 hectares) and a total of 252 775 tonnes have been harvested so far,” he said.

According to Agritex, Mashonaland West has harvested 82 993 tonnes, Mashonaland Central 59 876 tonnes, Manicaland 47 380 tonnes and Midlands 26 016 tonnes.

Farmers in Mashonaland East have harvested 24 110 tonnes of wheat, Matabeleland South 4 518 tones, Masvingo 3 956 tonnes and Matabeleland North 3 926.

This season, Government, through the Agricultural Finance Company (AFC) Leasing Company and the private sector, is assisting farmers with combine harvesters.

This season wheat was planted at different times and this will reduce pressure on the combine harvesters.

GMB has revealed that the bulk of the wheat being delivered to its depots is of premium grade.

The parastatal is buying wheat at $55 517,69 per tonne for ordinary grade at a 15 percent return on investment, and $66 621,22 per tonne for premium grade.

About 300 000 tonnes of wheat are expected from this year’s winter cropping season.

The country requires 360 000 tonnes of wheat annually.