Zimbabwe To Reap First Grain Surplus Since Land Redistribution program

Zimbabwean farmers may produce its first grain surplus since 2000, the year President Robert Mugabe’s administration began backing a the land redistribution program of acquiring white-owned farms and giving them to black Zimbabweans.

This year farmers will probably harvest 1.7 million metric tons of corn and other grains, with a surplus of 253,174 tons, according to the annual Zimbabwe Vulnerability Assessment Committee, known as Zimvac, which includes the Ministry of Agriculture and the United Nations World Food Program. Zimvac interviewed 10,782 households to compile the report, it said today in an e-mailed statement.

Good rains and increased government supplies of inputs helped farmers to more than double last year’s output of 798,600 tons, Zimvac said. The number of people requiring food aid this year will fall to 565,000, or 6 percent of the population, from about 2.2 million last year, according to the report.

This year Zimbabwe also reaped its biggest crop of tobacco, the country’s biggest export before 2000.

Source: Bloomberg Businessweek