Rice cooperatives in the country have called for the establishment of local structured and organised markets for the crop to motivate the farmers to boost output as well as investment in their agribusiness.

Speaking in Lilongwe on Thursday during a Rice Marketing Conference, Rice Development Trust vice-chairperson Ibrahim Benesi said rice is a cash crop with huge potential to supplement the foreign exchange the country gets from other crops, as such, there is need to improve production and marketing.

“The first problem we have is the lack of an organised market for rice which demotivates farmers from investing in their business,” he said.

Benesi said there is potential to produce more rice, observing that out of the 500 000 hectares (ha) available for rice production, the country only utilises about 100 000ha which means the rest of the land remains idle.

“What we need is a structured market whereby we have a market locally that is guaranteed with contracts and as well as markets internationally to export the produce,” he said.

Benesi expressed concern that most of the farmers sell their rice to vendors or intermediate buyer which does not bring them enough earnings.

He advised individual rice farmers to join cooperatives to benefit from economies of scale.

African Institute of Corporate Citizenship chief executive officer Driana Lwanda said one of the challenges affecting rice farmers is the lack of resources and expertise in modern farming technologies for rice.

She said: “When farmers increase their land to grow more rice, it would require more workers to assist.

So, farmers prefer small pieces of land to cut labour expenses, thereby affecting yield.”

Lwanda called for training of farmers on how they can improve rice output, saying many farmers lack enough knowledge on how to grow the crop.

She said adverse weather conditions also affect yield.

Karonga Rice Cooperative chairperson Andy Nyirenda said farmers should have opportunities to learn more on rice farming and how to source markets for their crop.

According to the Malawi National Rice Development Strategy that ran from 2017 to 2021, the rice sector faces many challeges which include low production and productivity of smallholder rice farmers.

The strategy further said there is an average of 58 percent yield gap for improved varieties and a 41 percent yield gap for hybrid varieties.

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