Mardef, government tout Filp

Government and the Malawi Rural Development Fund (Mardef) have hailed the Farm Input Loan Programme (Filp) President Joyce Banda recently launched, saying it has the capacity to transform the agriculture sector as farmers will be empowered to be independent. Filp will see farmers belonging to farmers’ clubs getting farm inputs on loans to be repaid after harvest. According to documents from Mardef, the farmers will be required to pay five percent of their total loan, meaning that if a farmer collects two bags of fertiliser at K17 000 (US$42.5) each, they will only repay K3 300 (US$8.25). Speaking in a recent interview, Mardef chief executive officer Joseph Mononga said by setting aside resources for loans to farmers in form of fertiliser and other farm inputs, government is demonstrating its commitment to improving agriculture. “The way the Filp loans have been formulated, it will be easy for any farmer who wants to increase his yields to access them. We are optimistic that all the farmers who are already in farmers clubs will approach us so that they can have the loans because the conditions are not as tough,” said Mononga. He said they have already registered 2 725 farmers in the Northern Region, 4 655 in the Eastern Region, 4 575 in the Southern Region and 39 650 in the Central Region. He said Mardef has learned from previous mistakes when loan beneficiaries did not repay the loans, saying they were gifts from government. Minister of Agriculture and Food Security James Munthali said the mere fact that Central Region has registered a lot of farmers is an indication that there is no politics in the programme. The ministry said Filp is targeting 750 000 farmers.