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Precious Manomano

Herald Reporter

THE Government has announced the suspension of duty on fertiliser imports to allow private players to bring in Ammonium Nitrate and Urea and guarantee adequate supplies for the season.

In a notice, Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development permanent secretary Professor Obert Jiri said the Ministry was inviting applications from farmers, farmer union groups, corporates or agencies to import the duty free fertilisers.

“The importation of these fertilisers will be allowed subject to proven records of farming, the capacity to import dressing fertilisers (Urea and Ammonium Nitrate. This follows the publication of SI 178 of 2024 on November 8, 2024.

“All the applicants must follow the correct procedures and requirements to qualify to import the fertiliser,” said Prof Jiri.

He advised interested parties to visit the One Stop Shop for export and import services at the Ministry.

Meanwhile, in a telephone interview, Prof Jiri said there was slow movement of fertilisers in the country adding that there was a need to increase production following the El Nino-induced drought, which ravaged the majority of crops in the region.

“It has become necessary to invite those farmers with capacity to import top dressing fertilisers for personal use to do so,” he said.

He said farmer unions needed to certify such farmers adding that monitoring would be done to ensure that the fertiliser obtained is utilised for the purpose of personal use.

Prof Jiri also indicated that the move would ensure an increase a 347 percent in cereal production from 744 271 tonnes last season to over 3, 2 million tonnes this season to improve national food security.

The plan is to recover from the effects of the drought, which ravaged the bulk of crops in the country.

Zimbabwe recently received fertiliser donations from Russia to support the Presidential Inputs Programme.

The donation collectively consisted of over 26 000 tonnes of fertiliser comprising 16 000 tonnes of Muriet of Potash (MOP) and 10 000 tonnes of Calcium Ammonium Nitrate (CAN).

Zimbabwe Commercial Farmers Union (ZCFU) president, Dr Shadreck Makombe commended the move saying it would help make sure unscrupulous business people would not fleece farmers of their hard-earned money.

He also said it was for the move to be extended to other products such as pesticides and packaging materials for crops like maize, tobacco and cotton.

“This is a very good move, which promotes crowd funding so that large quantities are imported. Farmers should come to bring in fertilisers in large quantities. This will help them to produce more and also create employment, which is critical,” he said.