‘Improve Affordable Inputs Programme’
Parliamentary Committee on Agriculture and Food Security chairperson Sameer Suleman has asked the Ministry of Agriculture to come up with ways to ensure the Affordable Inputs Progamme (AIP) benefits more Malawians as it is designed to.
He made the remarks at Parliament Building yesterday when Ministry of Agriculture officials met the Parliamentary Cluster One committee which comprises the Agriculture and Food Security and Natural Resources and Climate Change committees.
Suleman said Parliament wants government, through the ministry, to purchase fertilisers for the programme direct from manufacturers instead of using cartels.
He said: “It is clear that in the 2021/22 financial year, AIP has faced many challenges and failed to serve its purpose. We thought the ministry could have learnt from previous experiences, but sadly it seems no lessons were learnt and this year, [the programme has failed] Malawians”.
Responding on the cartels issue, Ministry of Agriculture Principal Secretary Sandram Maweru said a delegation is set to travel to Saudi Arabia where government intends to buy at least 400 000 metric tonnes (MT) of fertiliser for the next growing season.
He said: “To make the AIP better this year, we will buy fertiliser from manufacturers, one of whom has shown interest to supply us with 200MT of Urea and 200MT of NPK from Saudi Arabia. Soon, we will send a delegation led by the minister to start the talks.”
This comes as some farmers in the 2021/22 season failed to buy seed when fertiliser was not available in depots for fear of the system, indicating they have already purchased both two types of fertilisers.
According to the ministry, as of yesterday about 2.9 million out of the 3.7 million farmers have redeemed fertilisers. The redemption will end on March 15 2022.
