By Isaac Kambwiri, contributor:
Born 60 years ago in Ntanila Village, Traditional Authority Chakhaza, in Dowa District, Lameck Amon is one of the most successful farmers in his village.
The past decade, he has been cultivating commercial and food crops and had his socioeconomic life significantly boosted.
“During last growing season, I managed to harvest 25 bags of groundnuts from my one-and-a-half acres field of which, upon selling to Pyxus Agriculture I realised over K700,000.
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“This was possible because of the good variety of groundnuts which I was given by the same company, which, gave me high yields compared to other old local varieties which I used to grow previously,” Amon says.
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He is among 10,000 smallholder farmers who are cultivating groundnuts under the Integrated Production System (IPS), commonly known as contract farming, with the groundnuts buying and processing company.
Under this arrangement, the company provides the contracted groundnuts farmers with crop production inputs such as improved groundnuts seed, pesticides and fungicides, inoculant and fertiliser.
In addition, Pyxus also provides agriculture extension services to the growers through its field technicians deployed in most districts in Central and Northern regions.
Pyxus Agriculture, in collaboration with its sister company Alliance One Tobacco, has, so far, established an agronomy-based research department at Mpale Estate in Madisi, Dowa, where different crop trials are being done with an aim of improving agriculture production for both large and small-scale farmers.
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“The essence of coming up with these research innovations is to ensure that farmers in the country should be growing improved varieties of crops which should give them high yields.
“They should be able to get enough profits at the market just like what other farmers in developed countries are doing,” Pyxus Agriculture Managing Director Ronald Ngwira says.
Ngwira adds that so far, his company has done a number of agronomy-based research trials to crops such as groundnuts, tobacco, soya bean and wheat to enhance agriculture production.
He further states that Pyxus Agriculture occasionally invites the field technicians to the research site to train them and allow them to be acquainted with the new discoveries and train farmers in their areas.
“Our field technician trains us in modern farming methods such as planting groundnuts on double rows and applying fertiliser and chemicals to get high yields from small fields,” Amon says.
The farmer, who also grows tobacco, commends the contract farming arrangement, which both Pyxus Agriculture and Alliance One are implementing, saying it is beneficial to both parties.
He says smallholder farmers such as him are able to produce high quality crops which the companies willingly purchase at good prices.
Agriculture Minister Sam Kawale, who recently toured the research activities at Mpale Farm, hailed Pyxus Agriculture Limited and Alliance One Tobacco for coming up with the various agronomy-based research innovations.
Kawale said the research activities will help both large and smallholder farmers across the country to start growing improved crop varieties that can give them high yields and more profits.
“These two companies are our biggest partners in the two value chains of groundnuts and tobacco. So after this visit, we will go back and see how we can continue to collaborate with them from the research point of view up to the production as well as the market.
“As government, we are pleased to note that the private sector is ready to work with us by coming up with various solutions to agriculture problems,” the minister said.
He also indicated that the work of companies such as Pyxus Agriculture and Alliance One is ensuring Malawi is resilient to climate shocks and other weather-related challenges.
Pyxus Agriculture has the largest groundnut processing factory outside South Africa at its premises in Kanengo, Lilongwe, which has the capacity to process up to 50,000 metric tonnes of groundnuts per working day.
