By MAIMBOLWA MULIKELELA –

THE Crushers and Edible Oil Refiners Association (CEDORA) has pledged to support the development of smallholder farmers by providing them with reliable markets for their oil seed.
This was aimed at growing the sector to its optimal size, in the process increase the capacity of the utilization of existing plants and provide the opportunity for foreign exchange earnings by exporting refined edible oil into the region.
CEDORA consultant Aubrey Chibumba said this process would support the development of smallholder farmers and give them an alternative crop to maize.
The edible industry is probably the fourth largest industry in Zambia with a production capacity of 20,000 tonnes per month of refined vegetable oils.
Dr Chibumba said in an interview in Lusaka that it was important that the smallholder farmers were given a reliable market for their crops thereby supporting the diversification agenda.
“It is the intention of the Association to work with various stakeholders to ensure that small holder farmers develop efficiently so that benefits can accrue to both the smallholder farmers and the industry,” he said.
CEDORA was continuously inundated with reports from various research organizations of the impact of lack of diversification on incomes for small holder farmers.
The lack of diversification reflected itself in continued poverty levels among the small holder farmers.
“When you consider that over 80 per cent of our workforce and 20 per cent of our Gross Domestic Product (GDP) stems from agriculture, it suggests as a country we need to be serious about reducing poverty, by investing more agriculture.
Most of the agriculture is informal. This means that the smallholder farmers have the primary responsibility of arranging inputs, cultivation, harvesting, storage, transportation and sales of their produce,” Dr Chibumba said.
He said these logistical challenges were huge even for organised and well financed institutions.
“For the small holder farmer they are an effective chain to poverty. Clearly by linking the small holder to the oil seed processors presents opportunities where this chain to poverty can be broken,” he said.
More than US$150 million had been invested in the edible oil industry with a current production capacity of 20,000 tonnes of refined vegetable oil, over twice the domestic consumption of just under 10,000 tonnes per month.