Government has disclosed that it will export surplus maize following estimates that the country is this year expected to realize bumper harvest.

Making the announcement in Parliament, both Agriculture Minister Lobin Lowe and Minister of Finance Felix Mlusu said the country will have an excess maize produce of 1.1 million metric tonnes.

“In an interview, Mlusu said government is working on capacitating the state grain trader Agriculture Development and Marketing Cooperation (ADMARC) to purchase maize from farmers.

“All of us are seeing that we are going to have a bumper crop of maize this year and as government we want to make sure that any farmer who has got surplus maize should be able to sale that surplus maize to ADMARC,” said Mlusu.

He added that the surplus maize will be exported by both ADMARC and businesspersons whilst keeping enough stock for consumption in the country.

“We are going to capacitate ADMARC to make sure that they buy the maize off the farmers so no farmer will be left with stock in his or her house.

“Farmers can only keep what they want to use for their own consumption but anything in excess, the market will be there so we will allow businesspeople ADMARC included to export maize to nay market that they find,” disclosed Mlusu.

Government has attributed the bumper harvest to successful rolling out of the Affordable Inputs Programme (AIP) and good rains the country has received during this year`s farming season.