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Govt to Bring in New Dairy Investors
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Zimbabwe has for more than a decade failed to produce enough milk and has resorted to importing from South Africa, losing foreign currency.
High production costs such as electricity, labour, stock feeds and chemicals have been the major stumbling blocks to the full recovery of the dairy industry.
Despite the myriad of challenges being experienced in the sector, national milk output has been on a marginal increase over the past few years. According to figures released by the central bank recently, the country’s milk output for the fourth quarter 2018 increased 18 percent to 21 million litres from 17,8 million litres produced prior year comparative.
Lands, Agriculture, Water, Climate and Rural Resettlement Deputy Minister Vangelis Haritatos said the investment which is earmarked for Mashonaland West will see the country reaching self-sufficiency in twelve months.
"We have some very exciting new investments coming on board, one of them is the Belarusian investment. We signed a MOU with the Belarusian Government for agricultural investment, they are bringing in 1,000 herd of cattle for dairy production.
"That is one of many initiatives that we are doing, we also have Prodairies that are also investing heavily in the dairy sector. We have got a dairy company in Kwekwe, Dendairy, they are also investing heavily.
"We have a new investment coming in Mashonaland West, although that one I cannot tell you a great deal of because we haven’t finalised, but what I can tell you is that if that investment comes through, I strongly believe that we will be self-sufficient for dairy.
"If this (Investment) pulls through, it will produce 60 million litres annually by itself," said Deputy Minister Haritatos.
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Source: The Herald
TheCattleSite News Desk
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