Cotton farmers let in the cold

Chikwawa District, farmers are spending nights at Admarc depots waiting for the state grain trader to buy their produce.

Admarc is offering prices lower than those recommended by the government.

In Chikwawa Nkombedzi Constituency, Ngatha Admarc Deport, bales of cotton pile up like abandons cargo with their owners hopelessly waiting for when they would get money from their toil.

Thirty-eight-year-old Charles Ledford, who sold his cotton on credit at the depot three weeks ago and started spending his days and nights at the depot two weeks ago waiting for the money, cannot go back home for fear that he will miss his payment if it comes.

He claims that authorities told him that money for the 15 bales that he sold would arrive in a week and that his cotton has not been ferried from the depot.

Admarc is buying the cotton at K369 per kilogramme which is less than the K389 price recommended by the government.

The fact that farmers spend time at the depot guarding their produce means food has to be brought right there for them.

Member of Parliament for Chikwawa Nkombedzi, Abida Mia, says she asked government in Parliament to consider the plight of farmers in the district who are not reaping what they deserve from their toil.

Admarc spokesperson Agness Ndovi said the government had not yet given money to the parastatal to buy the crop the time we visited depots in Nsanje.

Cotton estimates in Malawi for 2020 have been pegged at 40,000 metric tonnes and the Shire Valley is likely to contribute a larger chunk of the produce as the crop fetched fair prices last year, a thing which propped more farmers to grow the crop.