Access to improved seeds by smallholder farmers is a prerequisite to increased maize production in West Africa, as climate change hurts yield from traditional varieties, a study by researchers working under the Drought Tolerant Maize for Africa Project (DTMA) has shown.

The study authored by Dr. Abdoulaye Tahirou and others notes that improved maize varieties tolerant of drought are helping farmers in addressing production risks and called for joint efforts to facilitate their wider dissemination across the subregion.

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Mini-buying centres for maize have been opened in various parts of the country by the National Cereals and Produce Board (NCPB), as it steps up efforts to save farmers from exploitation by cartels.

Speaking to the Nation on Thursday, NCPB managing director Prof Gideon Misoi, said most farmers stay far from main depots; hence, fall victim to middlemen.

“The move is meant to caution farmers from middlemen buying maize from them at low prices,” said Prof Misoi.

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Government has released US$26,2 million to fund this year’s winter wheat cropping. Agriculture, Mechanisation and Irrigation Development Minister Joseph Made said US$11 million would go to rehabilitation of smallholder irrigation schemes and US$5,2 million was for buying last season’s fertiliser and seed from the Grain Marketing Board.

“The other US$10 million will go towards mobilising other wheat production related resources,” Minister Made said in Harare yesterday. He said the sector needed an additional US$10m and the Finance Ministry was working on raising this.

“Banks are also mobilising resources for individual farmers and this is not part of this Government funding.

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In sub-Saharan Africa, many people, especially in rural areas, depend on staples such as white sweet potatoes or white maize, which may lack sufficient quantities of the nutrients their bodies need. Vitamin A deficiency, for instance, leads to at least 250,000 children going blind each year, according to the World Health Organisation, with half dying during the following year.

Sufficient quantities can be found in other foods eaten elsewhere in the world, but rather than undertake the daunting task of changing diets and traditions, plant breeders started trying to develop orange varieties of these crops that would do well in the particular growing conditions of sub-Saharan African countries.

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South African maize from genetically modified (GM) crops is completely safe for human and animal consumption, an independent biotechnology consultant Dr Wynand van der Walt said on Monday.

He was responding to comments by the African Centre for Biosafety (ACB) that South Africa had “dumped” GM maize on African markets, including Kenya, Mozambique and Swaziland.

“It is a pity that repeated media releases by ACB ignore basic facts and wallow in distorted information.

“Both South Africa and Kenya followed exactly the procedural requirements under the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, and the allegation that our maize is being dumped on African markets contrary to Protocol rules, is a blatant lie.”

Van der Walt said South African regulatory authorities had a working relationship with their counterparts in Swaziland and there was “no dumping”.

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