Cabinet has formed an inter-ministerial committee to explore cloud seeding technologies to support areas that may receive insufficient rainfall ahead of the 2025–2026 summer cropping season.
Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development Minister Anxious Masuka said this while briefing the media after a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday.
He added that agronomists are advising farmers to plant short-term crop varieties, as the Meteorological Services Department (MSD) expects good rains, albeit with a late start. Said Masuka:
“Regarding cloud seeding, perhaps the preamble of that is to say, Government through the Minister of Environment, Climate and Wildlife, the weather forecast, which was adopted by Cabinet I think last week or so, and that weather forecast is very positive.
“It says the season is similar to last year, although there will be an erratic start to the rainy season with reduced rainfall in October increasing into November, and by December, we’ll have normal to above normal rainfall patterns throughout the country, and we expect the season to last till March. So we’ll have a growing period of somewhere between 90 and 120 days.”
Masuka said agronomists had advised that farmers should plant short-term crop varieties. He said:
“The agronomic advice based on that meteorological focus is that we need to do short season crops and be able to do agroecological tailoring, but we realise the importance of augmenting this with cloud seeding, and cloud seeding can determine failure or success of a particular crop, especially in the case of maize.
“It is in that context that Cabinet, in its wisdom, formed an inter-ministerial committee which I chair on cloud seeding.”
The Minister also said the Government is exploring how to improve cloud seeding in three respects. He said:
“First, we want to investigate newer technologies for cloud seeding, and then we are investigating the actual operational modalities, and thirdly, we are also looking at resourcing the cloud seeding.
“The committee will be meeting later this week to try and go through the submissions by the working party and be able to recommend to the Cabinet appropriately.
“However, we do realise the utility of cloud seeding in enhancing rainfall and ensuring that we have a successful season, but this must be part of a collective of measures that we implement for the summer season.”
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