What Moisture Content – Mundubile

Mundubile dismisses moisture content excuse as government delays maize floor price announcement Opposition presidential candidate Brian Mundubile has dismissed government’s citing of high maize moisture content as an excuse for delaying the announcement of this season’s floor…

Mundubile dismisses moisture content excuse as government delays maize floor price announcement

Opposition presidential candidate Brian Mundubile has dismissed government’s citing of high maize moisture content as an excuse for delaying the announcement of this season’s floor price, arguing there is no direct link between the two and accusing the administration of sending contradictory signals to farmers.

Speaking on KBN TV’s State of the Nation, the NRPUP presidential candidate was asked about conflicting statements from the presidency and the Food Reserve Agency, with the Head of State saying a directive on the floor price had been issued while FRA maintains that moisture content in harvested maize remains too high for purchase.

Mundubile questioned the basis for linking the two issues at all.

“The question one would ask, what’s the relationship between the moisture content and the announcing of the price?” he said. “One can announce the price, the flow price, and go further to say FRA would only buy maize with moisture content below 12 percent. So there’s no relationship between the delayed announcement of the flow price and the moisture content.”

He noted that some farmers who harvested early would already have maize below the required moisture threshold, leaving them unable to sell despite meeting the standard.

“There could be some farmers out there who may have harvested early, and their maize, the moisture content in their crop has actually gone below 13 percent,” he said. “So where does that leave them? You clearly see that these are merely excuses.”

Mundubile pointed to the discrepancy between statements from the Head of State and FRA officials as evidence of deeper problems in how government communicates on the issue.

“The president makes an announcement at one platform, where he says the moisture content has gone down, and one would like to believe that he’s the head of state and he’s got all the information,” he said. “The very next minute, the HR person for FRA says the moisture content is very high. So it points to structural issues on how this government is being run.”

He said farmers had already endured months of delayed payment for the previous season’s crop and were anxious for clarity on the current one.

“Farmers went through a very difficult time when they had their payments withheld for over six months. They are merely trying to recover now,” he said, adding that farmers wanted the floor price announced so they could sell their maize and prepare for the next planting season.

Mundubile said the delays reflected a broader pattern in how the administration handled issues affecting ordinary Zambians compared with matters involving foreign investors.

“If the issues surrounding maize and moisture content involved foreign investors, President Hakainde Hichilema found a solution,” he said. “He would always dilly-dally, he would always give excuses when it comes to matters that are affecting the Zambian people, and the poor people in this particular case.”

He renewed his campaign’s proposal to install grain dryers across the country to eliminate moisture content as a barrier to selling maize, an idea he said had drawn mockery from the ruling party when he first raised it in Petauke.

“We would never take the moisture content to be a challenge. We have farms that have got dryers fitted there. The same day they harvest, they shell and they even dry to bring in the desired moisture content,” he said. “The UPND went up in flames to mock me when I talked about the dryers, but that’s really what the solution is.”

Mundubile committed to announcing the maize floor price in the first week of June each year under an NRPUP government, to give farmers adequate time to prepare for the following season.

Government had not responded to the specific criticisms at the time of the interview.