Farmers urged to practice crop diversification

Lilongwe District Agriculture Extension Coordinating Committee (DAECC) has urged farmers to practice crop diversification as one way of promoting food security, income and dealing with the effects of climate change.

Speaking in Lilongwe during an Agriculture Field Day, DAECC’s Chair representative Akunsitu Kananji said farmers need to practice crop diversion due to the effects of climate change the country and the world is experiencing.

“These days we experience erratic rains which eventually result to drought and sometimes we are affected by cyclones, so we want farmers to stop relying on maize alone, because as you can see, maize hasn’t done well this year but there are some other crops that are resilient and have done so well,” he said said.

Commenting on the matter, one of the farmers Judith Nkwena encouraged her fellow farmers to put into practice whatsoever Agriculture Field Assistants are teaching them so that they benefit from their agricultural activities.

“This is very important to every farmer who takes farming as a business because if you have different crops at the end of the season, one will be able to make a good amount of money, hence improve livelihood,” she said.

Lilongwe District Council Chair, Councillor Dan Mtayamanja urged farmers to take  agriculture field days seriously because it is where they can learn more on agriculture production and how their fellow farmers are doing in the fields for them to get bumper yield.

“As a council, our number one goal is to achieve is food security. Let me urge all farmers to stop rushing into selling their agriculture products to vendors. Let us stick to the prices that the government has released for us to benefit from our sweat,” he said.

This year’s agriculture field day was commemorated under the theme: “Diversified Agriculture, Good Agricultural Practices: A Resilient Strategy to Effects of climate change, To Achieve Food, Nutrition and Income Security”.