By Jessica Mwansa
THE fruit and vegetable Association has raised concern over the slump in tomato prices leading to farmers and traders making huge losses owing to lack of coordination in the production and pricing of the commodity.
Speaking to The Scoop, Association President Bernard Sikunyongana said some traders on the market had raised concerns about the current pricing of tomatoes which he said had drastically reduced due to high supply on the market.
Mr. Sikunyongana said during the rainy season, some farmers did not produce but did so immediately after the rains due to diseases.
“A box of tomatoes is now trading at K40 but normally, it is supposed to range above K100, with K100 being the lowest considering the increase in transport cost and inputs. Farmers begin growing tomatoes after the rainy season and up to now they are still harvesting, hence the low price. However, a challenge may perhaps surface in October because some of the small rivers and dams will be dry as well as low water levels from boreholes,” Mr. Sikunyongana said.
While anticipating the price of tomatoes to increase by the end of the year, Mr. Sikunyongana said there was a similar problem last year where one farmer was dumping the commodity at a giveaway price on the market after growing it on a large scale using centre pivots to knock out small scale farmers from the subsector.
“Some time last year, there was a serious supply of tomatoes and the demand was low with a box going for as low as K20 due to a farmer who decided to use a center pivot for growing tomatoes on a large scale thereby increasing the supply while the demand was almost the same, and in turn distorted everything.
“With normal production, the supply is the same with just a small increase due to the addition of new farmers. There is a tomato farmer who sends about 17 trucks of tomatoes to Lusaka in a day and about 10 to 20 trucks to Kasumbalesa thereby killing the market for other farmers to supply,” he said.
He said farmers must be protected and called on the Government to buy their proposal of putting up cold rooms.
“The Government must consider the initiative of putting up cold rooms in markets so that when tomatoes are ready, one cannot wait but harvest. We need to find a mechanism on how the Local Government can start putting up cold rooms in those big markets for the farmers to store the tomatoes,” he said.
He said this had been a challenge for farmers because there were no cold rooms where they could keep their goods after a good harvest until the price stabilised.
“We want to see how we can engage the Local Government to facilitate farmers with cold rooms to keep their commodities rather than throwing them away,” he said.
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