Fruits and Vegetables Association President has confirmed that there has been reduction in garlic production in the country which has affected the prices of the product which has doubled.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with the Zambia Business Times, Fruits and Vegetables President Mr. Bernard Sikunyongana said, Garlic production has gone down as the production for this year was very poor.
“The garlic that we have this year will only cater for two months as compared to all these years were our garlic would last up to 4 months of which the other 8months we would import from China,” He said.Sikunyonga further added that, up to now this year they are still importing from china of which was not supposed to be the case.
“Because of the rains our small scale farmers did not produce, looking at it that eastern province is the number one producer of garlic and if you look at the shortfall of rains due to climate change they could not produce enough as that is the current challenge we are facing as we are currently still importing Garlic from China,” He explained.
Sikunyongana further stated that the country’s consumption in regards to garlic amounts to about 100-200 tons per month.
“Currently we don’t not have commercial farmers that are big into garlic production as we currently just have smale scale farmers who do not have the capacity to put up irrigation centers on there farms as they solely depend on their dams and if you look at the ones from Chipata normally farm on wetlands, so normally you would find on their farms there is an area where water doesn’t dry quickly and that’s the part where they plant and irrigate and within a short period of three months they are able harvest,” He added.
He further stated that garlic is currently selling at about K180-K200 per Kg , as it used to trade below K100 but now it has doubled.
