Posted on March, 28, 2017 at 10:44 am
Officials in the Ministry of Agriculture have advised farmers to lobby for better prices from buyers in order to benefit from their sweat.
The ministry’s Chief Animal Health and Livestock Development Officer, Peter Makhambera, said for a long time smallholder farmers have been involved in a price battle with buyers.
He said it is high time the two sides found a long lasting solution to the problem.
He made the remarks during a farmers marketing conference that African Institute of Corporative Citizenships (AICC) held with farmers last week in Lilongwe.
One of the farmers, Tsogolani Kadya, said most of the farmers that are greatly affected with the issue of low prices are those that do not sell their merchandise through cooperatives.
“Low prices is indeed a major setback, but out of experience, I have noticed that it is better to sell under cooperatives as we dictate the prices to the buyers unlike selling alone where you have no say over the price,” he said.
Makhambera said negotiation is the best tool in any business.
“Most farmers complain about not making profits from their produce because of low prices. However, there seems to be no negotiations between the producer and the buyer. Most of the times, the buyers complain of getting low quantities from the producers,” he said.
AICC Programmes Officer, Mcloud Kayira, said his organisation usually brings farmers and buyers together with an aim of increasing knowledge of market information among them.
The conference brought together 60 farmers from Dowa, Ntchisi and Lilongwe.
Source: The Times Group