Chakwera says government to devise interventions for averting hunger

President Dr. Lazarus McCarthy Chakwera has disclosed that his administration is devising mechanisms for averting food crisis in the wake of the prolonged dry spells the country is facing.

Chakwera, who was responding to a question from Thyolo Thava legislator, Mary Navicha, in the National Assembly, stated that the government is awaiting the outcome of an assessment on the impact of the drought before undertaking to implement the measures.

But the President was quick to caution MPs against instilling what he termed as the ‘spirit of despair”, but a message of hope despite the unfavourable weather conditions.

Chakwera also advised the farmers to seriously consider venturing into irrigation farming as one of the ways to fight food insecurity at household level.

And in his response to the question on what his government is doing to spread irrigation farming countrywide rather than just in the Shire Valley, President Chakwera disclosed that his administration is implementing four irrigation projects based on the irrigation master plan.

He said the government has allocated 57, 000 hectares of farmland that will be under supplementary irrigation during this 2024 farming season.