24 Jan 2014

Batswana, especially those in the southern part of the country, may need to prepare for another year of low to no harvest, considering the low rains that the region has experienced this season.

Since many farmers depend on rainfall to start planting, non-availability or low rainfall has delayed the onset of the ploughing season leading many farmers to decide not to plant because it is already late.

In the Kgatleng District for example,  just over 3 000 hectares have been ploughed out of more than 20 000 hectares which were expected to be planted by the registered 6 000 farmers.

Kgatleng District crop coordinator, Ms Tiyedze Mariri said both tractor and animal drawn implements were used for ploughing and planting. She said half of the already ploughed hectares were row planted.

She encouraged farmers to heed the government’s call to use row planting as it produced better yields. Ms Mariri further said shortages of tractor drawn implements continued to hamper their efforts to help farmers on time as moisture may evaporate.

She said due to moisture shortage, row planting has proved to be a challenge which led to farmers using the broadcasting method. She complained about tractor owners who failed to service their tractors, leading to several breakdowns which delayed progress.

Ms Mariri implored tractor owners to service their equipment on time and ensure that they acquired all the necessary ploughing implements. She noted that farmers had more interest in planting maize as shown by the fact that it got finished from stock while sorghum remained. Farmers were afraid to plant sorghum as production tended to be low due to quela birds. 

She said they distributed all the 3 086 bags of maize seeds they received followed by cowpeas while sorghum and millet still remained in stock. Ms Mariri noted that maize requires a lot of water. She urged farmers to take care of their fields and guard against pests and other crop destroyers in order to harvest better yields. ENDS