CEO's Report
On the calendar of official events, the highlight of the year was the Board’s ‘coming of age’: the 21st anniversary of its legal existence. All previous Chairpersons, Chief Executive Officers and Board Members of long service – were invited by the current Board to attend a grand event at which the Honourable Minister of Agriculture, Water and Forestry (MAWF), amongst other dignitaries, gave an inspiring speech.
After the mediocre white maize harvest of the previous period reviewed, i.e. only some 40,466 t, the harvest during the current reporting period was up to a good tonnage of some 53,296 t.
On the horticultural fresh produce front, the Namibian Market Share Promotion by which importers are required to purchase an escalating minimum percentage of their turnover within Namibia, and which is being underpinned by the availability of detailed production, marketing and import databases, has now reached an import substitution level of some 29%. This reaffirms the steadily steep upward curve from only 7% when this initiative was started some years ago.
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Chairman's Report
Namibian producers are exposed to changing global marketing environments and a change in climatic conditions. Unfortunately, both these changes cannot be predicted precisely enough to make all the due long-term alterations; but with 21 years of experience – or, rather, existence – and all the support we are privileged to have, I am sure we are well positioned to fulfil our core function to create a marketing environment that is conducive to growing and processing crops in Namibia. The road towards a prosperous Namibian nation is strongly based on agricultural production. On this road food security on household-level is the first milestone and linked to that immediately the aim to produce more for a market. The existence of such a market, reliable in intake and prices, is of utmost importance for all producers. Producers of mahangu, maize, wheat and horticultural fresh produce should be encouraged to take upon themselves production risks firstly through a national drought and disaster scheme to cover for any extreme events and secondly by providing them as much as possible a secure market for all surplus produce at reasonable prices.
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