Farmers in Zomba district have been warned against selling their farm produce to unscrupulous traders in order to make profits and avoid hunger.

The warning has been issued by the Zomba District Agriculture Development Crops Officer Josiah Ngochera as farmers have recently harvested their crops.

Ngochera said although currently their office has not registered such cases in the district, but farmers should be cautious when selling their harvest.

Ngochera said: “This time around when farmers have just harvested vendors flock into the villages to coax them with little money, food and other items in exchange with their produce such as maize, a development which put farmers at a risk of making loses.”

He further advised farmers to reserve enough maize that they have harvested for food to avoid severe hunger that may hit their families before the next harvesting season.

According to Ngochera, an adult person consumes not less than six bags while a child consumes three bag per year.

He therefore asked the farmers to reserve their harvested maize for food in accordance to the size of their families before taking it to the market.

Commenting on the previous farming season, Ngochera described it as successful despite the district registering excessive rainfall which somehow had a negative impact on the maize crop in few areas.

He also bemoaned a low number beneficiaries from Farm Impute Subsidy Program (FISP) saying out of 219,707 farming families from the district’s nine agriculture Extension Planning Areas (EPAs), only 61, 700 families benefited.