Side marketing of soya beans now a crime

FARMER organisations have expressed concern over the newly gazetted Statutory Instrument 97 of 2021, which criminalises the side marketing of soya beans by contract farmers and introduced a fine of three times the value of the produce that would have been side marketed or imprisonment of not more than two years in the case of a defaulted payment.

The SI has also given the Grain Marketing Board (GMB) absolute autonomy to control the sale of soya beans in all the 10 provinces of the country as well as absolute rights in the export of the product. The new SI key features are that soya beans will only be sold to GMB or the sponsoring contractor, except the retention of not more than 100kgs and that only GMB will be allowed to export soya beans.

It also noted that all soya beans transacted outside these guidelines will be liable for seizure and those behind that prosecuted and any aggrieved party can only appeal to the High Court. In an interview, Zimbabwe Commercial Farmers’ Union vice-president Mr Winston Babbage said it was unfair for farmers to be paid in local currency when most of them would have used foreign currency for all their soya beans farming needs and they were opting for a payment method similar to miners.

“It is very unfair for us to be paid in RTGS. As farmers what we want is a payment system similar to what is being done to miners who get US dollars for their commodities. Most farmers plant soya beans on their own and to be told that you can only take it to the GMB will not be fair, it should be an open market,” said Mr Babbage.

He said not being able to export individually as farmers or as a collective will affect them a lot because soya beans are a key ingredient in the manufacture of stock feed, hence it was very much in demand.

Ministry of Lands, Agriculture, Water, Fisheries and Rural Resettlement legal advisor Mr Darlington Tshuma said GMB had provision for exemption for farmers that had unique and exceptional cases for them to be paid in foreign currency.

“The GMB through its loss control department has provision for exemption where the farmers have unique and exceptional cases. The farmer applies for such an exemption and the team at GMB assesses the application based on actual evidence before granting the exemption,” said Mr Tshuma.

He also noted that the aim of the SI was to protect contracted crops from side marketing, but there was also room to accommodate special and unique cases and contractual arrangements were not be affected by the SI rather protected from side marketing.

Meanwhile, in previous years most farmers had been exporting soya beans and the effects were seen in the rise of cooking oil prices and other soya by-products. The SI has come about as Government tries to curb the problem.

SI 97 of 2021 which came through the Grain Marketing (Control of Sale of Soya Beans) Regulations last week was also accompanied by the Statutory Instrument (SI) 96 of 2021 through the Grain Marketing (Control of Sale of Cotton) Regulations 2021.

The two SIs are meant to give contractors guarantees that their investments would be safe in Zimbabwe while fresh funding would be unlocked as the playing field levels out.-sundaynews.cozw