07 Jul 2019

In an effort to respond to the prevailing drought in the country, government has introduced a 35 per cent livestock feed subsidy.

This was revealed by Minister of Agricultural Development and Food Security, Mr Fidelis Molao at a kgotla meeting in Sebina recently.

He said the subsidy, which effected this month, was meant to cushion farmers from the prevailing drought conditions.

The minister urged farmers to take advantage of the aid and buy feed for their livestock in order to protect them from the drought.

He further advised them to reduce the number of their cattle by selling some to Botswana Meat Commission (BMC).

Mr Molao further said BMC had promised to begin collecting cattle directly from farmers, and advised them to group themselves and identify their collection point to make it easy for the commission.

He said the arrangement would relief farmers of transport costs as well as assist BMC to collect a large number of cattle in one location.

The minister noted that they had in the past made arrangements to increase BMC prices, but that it had come to their attention that feedlot owners were not giving the price increase to farmers.

He said his ministry was going to put measures in place to ensure that farmers benefitted from the price increase.

Meanwhile, farmers commended government for the livestock subsidy, noting that it would enable them to protect their animals from the drought.

They, however, called for price regulation at BMC, arguing that the commission’s prices were low to  the extent that farmers opted to sell to butchery owners.  This, they said, left BMC with low supply and failure to meet its demand. ENDS