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{
    "id": 821337,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/821337/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 231,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
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    "speaker": null,
    "content": "Madam Temporary Speaker, I request for three more minutes because I want to make a particular point here. On the hybrid maize, there are so many bogus – I want to use that word advisedly – companies that are deliberately carrying the maize and labelling it as tested hybrid maize. The ability and capacity of this seed to generate a good maize stock is wanting. How do we safeguard our farmers, yet we have research institutions in this country? These institutions are supposed to vet the right storage and seed variety, given the geographical regions. For example, the seeds to be used in Ukambani should be different from the ones used in high altitude areas. We have the 614 and 615 variety or the new seed variety that has come in the market. We have different varieties for short and long rains, et cetera . Farmer are left in a quagmire and do not know which seed to use. What does he then do? He just walks into the shamba or to somebody next door, picks the maize cob, looks at it, thinks it is healthy and plants it. What happens next? Sometimes they are told that if they plant a certain variety, they will get 20 to 30 bags of maize per acre. However, they end up getting six to eight bags per acre, or even less, after using that seed variety. What happens to that investment? The long and short of it is that the farmer has been taken for a ride. Madam Temporary Speaker, the Government that is asking us to consider food security as the fourth flagship programme in the Big Four Agenda. If that is the position and for us to support that element of food security, we should now do a generation of things. At the end of it, we need to completely overhaul seed production, storage, the functioning and the legal entity called the NCPB. Maybe the time has come to liberalise this business with the mind of keeping the simple farmer protected. Thank you, Madam Temporary Speaker. I felt that I needed to flag out the issues that need to be looked into. Later on, when the report is tabled here, we should then dissect it to see whether these objectives have been met or not. I beg to support."
}