Delays to make available farm inputs under the Affordable Inputs Programme (AIP) have stirred panic among farmers in areas that have received rains deemed fit for planting.

Farmers Union of Malawi (FUM) chief executive officer Jacob Nyirongo said in an interview yesterday further delays in delivery of inputs will affect maize yield and national maize output.

He said: “During the launch of AIP [on Saturday], we received a report that the government has started delivering fertilisers to some selling points.

Women work in a garden during the previous growing season

“However, most areas are yet to receive inputs. This ultimately reduces the effectiveness and efficiency of the subsidy programme and might result in an increase in households who will be food insecure and in need of food aid.”

Nyirongo argued that fertiliser procurement needed to be prioritised by the government, especially when the country had limited foreign exchange reserves.

“Actually government should start now the process of securing fertiliser for 2023/24 season,” he said.

Random interviews with individual farmers in the country’s three regions showed that most areas have received adequate rains for planting, but subsidised inputs are yet to be delivered.

An AIP beneficiary from Phalombe, Edson Chisoni, said despite being advised by agriculture authorities to plant with the fist rains and apply basal dressing after a week, he is unable to follow the instructions as he is yet to get the resources.

“There is no communication, we just hear on radios that the President has launched the AIP, but here even verification of names has not happened. However, those who are capable are buying seeds and are planting,” he said.

Concurring with Chisoni, Doris Malitala from Dedza and Gift Mkandawire from Mzimba pleaded with authorities to act fast, saying further delays mean they might face hunger next year.

But Ministerial Task Force on AIP chairperson Richard Chimwendo Banda played down the farmers’ fears.

In a separate interview, he said it was too early to complain that inputs were not delivered as the programme was launched last Saturday.

Chimwendo Banda, who is also Minister of Youth and Sports, said: “It’s too early. Ask me next week and we will be able to give you a breakdown.”

Commenting on the development, National Smallholder Farmers Association of Malawi chief executive officer Betty Chinyamunyamu said on Tuesday there is need for the government to set up a long-term strategy to address challenges facing the programme.

“We need clarity on the direction and future of AIP and a clear medium to long- term strategy would help to provide this,” she said.

Chinyamunyamu said if the government can show clearly in its five-year AIP plan and strategy, for example, how it will be reducing the number of beneficiaries every year, farmers would realise that they need to prepare to source commercial inputs and not depend on AIP.

In his ministerial statement on the status of this year’s programme, Minister of Agriculture Sam Kawale urged people not to panic over this year’s AIP, saying the programme is going to be a success.

During the launch of the programme in Dedza, President Lazarus Chakwera conceded that the 2022/23 AIP has been an uphill task, pinpointing fertiliser suppliers’ sabotage, public officers’ incompetence and commodities competition on the global market as among five key threats.

Government has come under criticism for delaying to implement AIP as analysts have expressed fear the inputs may not reach the farmers in time.

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