Food Security Pack beneficiaries express gratitude
Mwinilunga District Community Development Officer Lunza Imwiko has expressed gratitude to the government for increasing the allocation of farming inputs under the Food Security Pack programme to the district from 300 to 1800 packs.
Ms Imwiko said the development is a huge milestone towards reaching out to more vulnerable and viable people not only in the district but the rest of the country.
She said the action is encouraging, noting that this is the first time the district is receiving such an allocation in over 10 years.
Ms Imwiko said this during the District Food Security Pack stakeholder’s engagement meeting, for the 2021/2022 farming input distribution.
Mrs Imwiko has however bemoaned the low acceptance and uptake of legume cultivation by beneficiaries under the Food Security Pack programme.
She noted that most vulnerable beneficiaries under the programme only use cereals given to them and keep the legume seeds.
“The challenge is that most of our beneficiaries have not yet embraced the cultivation of cereals like soya beans, which are more nutritious and fetch more money,” she explained.
The District Development Officer called on stakeholders such as the Ministry of Agriculture to help in building interest and capacity among the beneficiaries towards cultivating legumes.
She said beneficiaries should be helped to embrace the cultivation of legumes such as soya beans, adding that these crops are not only high in nutrition value but are fetching much more money on the market.
Ms Imwiko said this will help to improve household food security and provide a steady financial income which will help them come out of the vulnerability bracket.
“From the field visits so far, it is promising that most of the beneficiaries will have a good yield this year,” she said.
However, Ms Imwiko has expressed confidence that most beneficiaries under the FSP programme will be food secure owing to field visits and monitoring that have revealed that approximately 90 percent successfully planted their cereals.- ZANIS
