NO FRA DEPOT WILL CLOSE BEFORE ALL THE FAMERS SALE THEIR MAIZE IN LUSAKA PROVINCE-MULYATA
Today, Lusaka Province Minister Sheal Mulyata toured Food Reserve Agency (FRA) maize depots in Chongwe, Rufunsa and Luangwa districts to appreciate the progress and challenges in the ongoing crop marketing season.
Here are the highlights:
✅Hon. Mulyata assured farmers in the province that no Food Reserve Agency (FRA) depot will be closed before all the farmers sale their maize.
✅The country has this year recorded an unprecedented maize bumper harvest of about 3.6 million Metric Tons of maize, prompting President Hakainde Hichilema to direct the FRA to buy more than the usual 500,000 Metric Tons for national strategic reserves to one million Metric Tons to allow more farmers sale their grain.
✅And Hon. Mulyata commended the farmers for their efforts to increase maize production adding that this has also been made possible by the New Dawn government’s good Farmer Input Support Programme (FISP) administration and President Hichilema’s emphasis on increasing maize and other crop production as well as the favorable weather.
✅The Minister attributed the overwhelming response by farmers to supply maize to the FRA due to the FISP bonding for all beneficiaries to supply at least 10 bags of grade a white maize to the FRA.
✅She urged the FRA to ensure that any challenges reported in the field are brought to the attention of authorities and sorted out promptly to avoid frustrating the hard-working farmers.
✅Meanwhile, FRA Provincial Marketing Coordinator Lundu Sichale revealed that the province has so far bought over 55,000 Metric Tons of white maize from farmers amounting to about K400 million as of 20th August 2025, with over 65,000 Metric Tons still available on the market.
✅Satellite depots in Rufunsa and Chongwe have been overwhelmed by congestion as farmers have been trooping to sale their maize at the cost of k340 per 50 kilograms bag of maize.