Food shortages to worsen after Zimbabwe wheat crop slumps again

Jun 2, 2008, 9:34 GMT

Harare/Johannesburg - Shortages of bread in Zimbabwe are expected to worsen after preparations for the country's winter wheat crop failed, state media said Monday.

As President Robert Mugabe flew to Rome for the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) summit on food security, the state-controlled daily Herald said that farmers planted 8,963 hectares of wheat this winter, only 13 per cent of a government target of 70,000 ha.

It was also 53 per cent less than last year's plantings.

'We have missed the target, with challenges being shortages of fertilizers and fuel as well as frequent breakdowns of tillage facilities,' Agriculture Minister Rugare Gumbo was quoted as saying.

Irrigation of the just planted crop was also affected by power cuts, he said.

Zimbabwe used to produce close to 400,000 tonnes of wheat annually, but output has collapsed since ruling party members and allies began seizing white-owned commercial farms in 2000, driving down agricultural output by over 60 per cent. Bread is always in short supply now.

Zimbabwe's winter wheat crop needs to be planted by May 10, after which the rate of germination of the seed and development of kernels on the plant become increasingly negligible.

'We should not expect much from any plantings after the deadline,' the Herald quoted an unnamed agricultural economist as saying.

Agriculture analysts said the fall in wheat plantings also resulted in part from the violent occupation of scores of white-owned farms immediately after March elections in which 84-year-old Mugabe's party was beaten by the pro-democracy opposition.

Mugabe, who is in Rome with his wife Grace, has been allowed to circumvent a European travel ban on him and about 200 members of his ruling elite, because of a loophole that permits them to attend United Nations meetings.