Zimbabwean Government To Step Up Dairy Production With Command Dairy Initiative

By Adesola Ikulajolu

Milk producers in Zimbabwe have increased milk production by 4 million liters from last year despite numerous challenges.

In an interview with Mr. Msipa said milk production had improved since last year despite the poor rainfall received in the last summer cropping season which resulted in poor pastures.

 “We improved on milk production by about 4 million liters this year compared to last year. This is despite the scarcity of pastures which we believed resulted from poor rains last year. If our farmers benefit from Command Dairy, we have no doubt that we will meet the national demand and reduce the government’s import bill.” He explained.

Zimbabwean government had asked dairy farmers to submit a proposal to be incorporated into the Command Dairy in an endeavor to increase Zimbabwe’s milk production as well as reduce the country’s import bill.

He said the Zimbabwe Dairy Farmers’ Association was in the process of coming up with a proposal at the behest of Government so that dairy farmers would be incorporated into the Command Agriculture scheme that was tailor made to avert hunger and ensure food security at national level.

Mr. Msipa continued that dairy farmers were making frantic efforts to ensure that they met the national annual milk demand and that the farmers had made significant strides in dairy farming.

“Government has helped us in so many ways before. We know there is a policy to spare dairy farms from the land redistribution exercise. This time government has asked to submit a proposal so that we will be incorporated into the Command Agriculture (programme). We understand government want to introduce Command Dairy which will help us enhance productivity.

“We have a national demand of 180 million liters of milk against our collective production capacity of 150 million liters per year. The Midlands province produces eight million liters per month and is one of the largest milk producers in the country,” he said.