…. Laments Climate change as a real challenge
BY DELISA THWALA
MBABANE– Through NAMBoard, the Ministry of Agriculture has established a revolving fund valued at E 10 million for vegetable farmers to access affordable credit.
This was revealed in the performance report for the financial year 2022/2023 under review at the Parliament.
In their report, the Ministry said the fund will be administered by Eswatini Bank and will also draw support from the Small-Scale Enterprises Loan Guarantee (SSELG) scheme at the central bank.
“This fund comes with preferential credit conditions including low-interest rates and no contribution from the farmer. NAMBoard was also able to host for the first time, two innovation platforms for the horticulture industry. These are platforms where all industry stakeholders have an opportunity to discuss matters that affect their business environment,” read the report in part.
Through these platforms, it was mentioned that the Ministry of Agriculture was able to identify challenges affecting the industry and is actively working on solutions for the betterment of the horticulture industry and food security in the country.
Worth noting is that the Ministry has continued to support farmers through the Input Subsidy Programme and the Tractor Hire Service.
The contribution by the government was increased to 65 percent this year in order to provide a cushion for farmers in light of the escalated prices of farming inputs. To increase the efficiency of the tractor hire service, the Government, through funding from The Republic of China (Taiwan) procured tractor-drawn farm implements which are already being used to serve farmers.
The Minister of Agriculture Jabulani ‘Buy Cash’ Mabuza further highlighted the challenges his Ministry faced throughout the year.
“Chairperson, members of the committee, the sector faces challenges in its day-to-day activities. The major one was climate change, which continued to be a major threat to the horticulture industry.
“Some areas have been repeatedly hit by hailstorms making it almost impossible to produce crops. Therefore, undercover production is becoming a necessity under the prevailing climatic conditions,” he said.
Climate change was said to be the biggest, challenge and currently in the country, the National Disaster Management Agency (NDMA) is looking into the issue.
