National Food Reserve Agency -NFRA says buying maize from neighbouring countries, would be their last resort if they fail to meet their 105,000 metric tonnes target from locally, despite a 530,000 metric tonnes deficit in harvests of the grain this year.

NFRA Chief Executive Officer, George Macheka, has confirmed this to Zodiak Online saying apart from small-scale farmers, they are also buying maize from mega farmers, before getting to traders.

He says the thier projected target would be enough for consumption in the lean season, stressing that the deficit would then fall to companies that need maize as a raw material for their products.

"In our planning the second option is that should we not find adequate maize on the local market, that's when we are going to resort into importing, but we are going to do that after we have exhausted the local market", he stresses.

"Definitely the maize in the country is not enough, just to mention that this maize is not only for consumption, but we got buyers like those buying for chicken feed, we are all buying the same maize".

Macheka expressed confidence that the agency will mobilize additional resources to the MK60 billion government allocated for the procurement of maize, saying last year they sourced additional MK47 billion to MK20 billion that was allocated.

However, agricultural expert Dr Kingdom Kwapata, faults the plan, saying it is not solving a problem, adding that maize will only be shifted from rural areas to silos, leaving them without enough to eat.

"Securing from within is going to be a devastating move because it is going to wipe out the majority of the available maize in circulation, which will cause scramble for the commodity" he stresses.

Dr Kwapata suspects the prevailing forex shortages, could be the main reason NFRA is opting to procure the grain from the local market.

In the 2024-2025 agriculture season, the country has produced about 2.962,620 metric tonnes of maize, against an annual demand of about 3.5 metric tonnes.