05 Nov 2020

Horticulture farmers in Maun and its catchment areas have welcomed the move by Botswana Horticulture Council (BoHoCo) to establish horticulture market centres.

They welcomed the establishment of the market centres since lack of access to market has been a major challenge despite investing more resources in production. 

Farmers said this during a courtesy call by BoHoCo executive committee members who were on a mission to give feedback to its members on the implementation of some of the resolutions made during their last conference in Molepolole.

They learnt that the market centres would be established in Francistown and Lobatse while collection centres would be opened in areas far from the market centres.

Farmers commended the council for its continued efforts to improve the horticulture industry, which they said was faced with challenges such shortage of roads infrastructure to the farms and lack of land to produce more vegetables among others. They appealed to the executive committee to fastrack operation of the market centres because currently they did not have market to sell their produce.

The vice chairman of Ngamiland Horticulture Growers Association, Mr Onkeme Gaepobe concurred with farmers that access to market was a challenge in the district.

He welcomed the establishment of the market centres saying it would motivate farmers to produce more and feed the nation. 

He also noted that farmers were hopeful that they would benefit from supplying local primary schools through the local authority (council) just like in other districts but that was not the case. 

The council, he said opted to use direct procurement instead of the usual tendering process and as the association, they questioned the arrangement as it was disadvantaging others farmers.

Mr Gaebope said that efforts were made to engage the relevant authorities to resolve the issue adding that a proposal which included a table of prices had been submitted to the council and currently awaiting response.

 As the association, he said they were disturbed by the arrangement because in Okavango Sub-district, the council engaged the association and all was going smoothly.

 Earlier on, BoHoCo chairperson, Ms Sekgabo Ramatu told the meeting that the council had introduced a business wing hence the registration of a cooperative named Horticulture Cooperative Market Society Limited (HOTCOMS) with a view to encourage sourcing of fruits and vegetables from local farmers.

The establishment of HOTCOMS, she said would be done in Lobatse and Francistown adding the ministry of Agricultural Development and Food Security had handed over their facilities to be used as market centres.

In addition, she said in other areas far from the market centres, collection centres would be established where produce would be sorted, graded and packaged according to standards and customer needs.

The market centres, she said would comprise of a service centre where farmers could buy seeds and fertilisers. 

Ms Ramatu also noted that they had engaged National Food Technology Research Centre to test quality of their produce.

She also said that to have effective market centre, they needed funding to buy equipment, recruit workers who would run the market centres and urged farmers to join the cooperative in large numbers. 

Members could join with P500 once off and pay P1 000 to be a shareholder for a life time.

Ms Ramatu acknowledged efforts by HOTCOMS saying the board had already submitted a proposal to Citizen Entrepreneurship Development Agency (CEDA) requesting funding to secure equipment and hoped they would be successful. 

She said the cooperative would operate once the equipment was in place. ends