02 Jul 2020

Letlhakeng Sub-district Crop Production Office is expecting high yield production from the over 25 501 hectares ploughed by 6 417 farmers.

In an interview, principal agricultural scientific officer, Ms Ntlhokwa Zolo said they were expecting an estimated total production of 60 217.16 metric tonnes.

Ms Zolo said already a total of 453.44 metric tonnes had been collected from 1 121.80ha while harvesting was still ongoing.

She added that Letlhakeng sub-district production area was well known for high yield production and the commitment of farmers always paid off.

However, she said even though yield was not satisfactory in the last planting season, they remained hopeful that production would be high this season.

On seed and fertilizer production, Ms Zolo said a total of 236.38 metric tonnes of maize seeds was acquired through coupons by 5 072 farmers at a cost of more than P5 million and a total of 81.73 metric tonnes of cow peas were acquired by 1 931 farmers at a cost of over P1.7 million.

She said a total of 288.5 tonnes of fertilizer were distributed to 96 farmers while 288.5 tonnes were acquired through coupons by 61 farmers at a cost of a little over P1.1 million.

Ms Zolo further said the sub-district had cleared a backlog of individual fencing applications.

She said a total of 181 applications of individuals who had made their down payment since June 2018 to January 2020 had been processed.

She added that there were three cluster filed fences in the sub-district which inclded Malwelwe at 1 844ha, Phuduhudu at 5 686ha and Monwane at 5 085ha.

Meanwhile, Ms Zolo decried low ploughed hectares in the clusters which meant fields were lying un-utilised even though they wished that all fields be ploughed to increase yield and feed the nation.

She said out of a total of 12 615 cluster hectares, only 2 581.05ha had been ploughed in the 2019/2020 planting season.

She therefore encouraged farmers to put to use the fenced cultivable hectares as they could yield better production without disruption from animals.

Ms Zolo said they had used more than P2.3 million to buy produce from farmers during the COVID-19 pandemic food relief programme.

She said the produce bought included cowpeas, maize, water melon, tomatoes, green pepper, rape/spinach, among others.

On the other hand, Ms Zolo said the sub-district was facing challenges which included,  acute shortage of transport which hindered collection of produce, slow draught power payments due to GABS system, unutilised cultivable area in cluster fenced farms and double dipping in individual fencing-farmers benefit programme.

Nevertheless, she said they had put in some interventions to help push their workload through sourcing transport from other departments, engaging officers during weekends when GABS was performing better and also encouraging farmers to lease their fields to investors. ends