Minister of Agriculture Sam Kawale has said government wants more people to embrace commercial farming and use of mechanisation so that the country’s crop production increases.
He said this during the launch of the National Economic Empowerment Fund (Neef) Farm Inputs Loan Programme for the Southern Region in Nsanje and Chikwawa districts on Saturday.
Kawale said the ministry is implementing agricultural reforms where they are moving agriculture development from subsistence farming to commercial farming.
He said government wants to empower farmers to have adequate inputs to use in their fields for them to have enough food at both household and national levels.
Said Kawale: “For a long time, we have been investing in smallholder farmers by giving them two bags of fertiliser through the Affordable Inputs Programme which is not enough to feed the whole nation.
“That is why we are migrating farmers from subsidy programmes to commercial farming.”
The minister said that is why government has invested about K900 billion towards the Programme.
On his part, Neef chief executive officer Humphrey Mdyetseni said so far, they have made remarkable progress with the programme, having reached out to 36 000 farmers out of the 300 000 targeted across the country.
