Rains Threaten Winter Wheat Quality

Farmers have been urged to expedite the harvesting of winter wheat as the rains currently pounding most parts of the country could seriously affect wheat quality.

Zimbabwe is expecting a bumper wheat harvest but agricultural Rural Development Services chief director Obert Jiri revealed that to date, only 35 per cent of the winter wheat has been harvested. Said Jiri:

There is no advantage to keeping winter wheat in the fields because its quality will be reduced. In fact, it will not become wheat if rains fall on it.

So, we expect wheat farmers to really expedite harvesting because all the wheat in the country is now dry.

At the moment there are lighter rains, but if rains persist, this will definitely affect the quality of the wheat.

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So we are appealing for every combine harvester in the country to be deployed and mobilised for wheat harvesting.

We are at about 30%-35% in terms of our wheat harvesting. We have so far harvested 29 000 hectares out of 137 000 hectares out there.

Because of the rains, we expect harvesting to be fast so that we can move into the summer planting season without incurring any major losses.

The President of the Senate, Mabel Chinomona, who also planted wheat this year, said the quality of the wheat has not yet been affected but the rains but warned that things can go south at any moment. She said:

We are now self-sufficient in terms of wheat. So we encourage the government to make sure that winter wheat is harvested across the country to avoid losses.

We have enough wheat, but it just needs to be harvested on time. Yes, we experienced rain, but it was not that serious.

Recently, Agriculture ministry secretary John Bhasera said the country has a surplus of over 100 000 tonnes of wheat. | NewsDay