Ministry of Agriculture says it has identified a fertilizer manufacturer in Saudi Arabia who will be supplying the product to Malawi.

The development follows an announcement by Minister of Finance Sosten Gwengwe who disclosed that from now onwards, government will be procuring fertilizer straight from manufacturers.

Speaking during a meeting with the Parliamentary Cluster on Agriculture and Food Security, Secretary for Agriculture Sandram Maweru said government is optimistic that the move will bring sanity in the sector.

He said: “We will ensure that we enforce what the State President when he said that government should change its focus to buy fertilizer from manufacturers.”

“With that effect, we have a delegation that has been arranged to go to Saudi Arabia to meet one of the manufacturers who has expressed willingness to give us fertilizer at a price of factory level.”

Maweru has also disclosed that government will close fertilizer redemption in the Affordable Inputs Programme (AIP) on March 15 this year.

“We are now at 2.9 million beneficiaries out of the 3.7 beneficiaries and redemption is continuing compared to last year where we closed on February 20.

But because of the late onset of the season, we have extended to March 15 and we have assured them that that will continue,” said Maweru.

But the Cluster has called upon the Ministry to fast-track processes behind drafting of Fertilizer and Seed Bills.

“We have been making noise on these two Bills and today we were assured of the team from the Ministry that we will be having the Seed Bill during this sitting.”

It is our hope that that Bill does really come so that we scrutinize it and pass it because we know that Bill will change a lot for the benefit of smallholder farmers,” said Sameer Suleman, the Cluster’s chairperson.