The Greenbelt Authority and Mpatsa Holdings Limited in July signed a shareholding agreement to form a joint company through which the two parties are expected to work together in implementing irrigation and livestock agriculture projects.
The agreement signed at Mpatsa Holdings Limited premises followed a series of discussions between the two parties who hold a common ground of facilitating large scale commercial agriculture productivity.
According to the Greenbelt Authority, the venture is one of its kind, involving a local company with great capability of contributing to the drive of escalating agriculture commercialization and productivity.
Chairperson for the Greenbelt Authority's Board of Directors Counsel Wester Peter Kosamu said the signed agreement signified the genesis of a long mile journey that will see Malawians reap the fruits of Government's investment.
“For a long time the Government of Malawi has engaged foreign investors in big ventures such as these, and to their level the ventures have had benefits and losses all together, but this time that we are engaging a fellow Malawian with capacity and passion about his country, we believe this a journey to success,” said Kosamu.
He added that a great track record that Mpatsa Holdings Limited possessed, coupled with demonstrated capacity as seen through preparedness to contribute capital dividends was also one of the reasons the company was trusted to work with the Authority.
Out of the signed agreement, a new company named Mpatsa-Greenbelt Mega Farm Limited was to be formed and put in place to manage earmarked projects in cultivation agriculture, livestock production as well as agro-processing targeted at cooking oil production.
“Once we are set, the first project to take shape will be the farming of maize at Mpatsa Holdings Limited’s 700 hectares Estate located at Khonjeni in Thyolo District. Subsequently, various high value crops will be produced from there in both irrigation and rain fed seasons,”Kosamu added.
Mpatsa Holdings Limited's Chairman Jimmy Korea Mpatsa said the trust that the Malawi Government has put in his company through the Greenbelt Authority is already a motivation for the company to deliver.
He said operations under the new company will primarily center on producing in high quantities and quality to end hunger and earn forex for the country through exports of farm produce.
“Over the discussions that we have had with the Greenbelt Authority we have come to realize that our partner’s main goals revolve around achieving national food security, but also assisting the government in earning forex through producing and processing for exportation; so as Mpatsa we will work with them along those lines to ensure that the common Malawian has benefitted from the proceeds of this agreement,” he said.
He added that in his company’s concept, Malawi has a lot of land that is good for production, but mostly finances to support large scale agriculture production are not available, a thing that has continued to render the country poor and hungry.
“So ventures such as these are the ones that the country needs in order for our people to be bailed out of poverty and hunger,” he further said.
The Malawi Government initiated the implementation of the Mega Farms Programme which is facilitated by the Ministry of Agriculture through the Greenbelt Authority with an aim of eliminating national hunger by producing in large scales, a plan which the Mpasa Greenbelt Mega Farm Limited will contribute to.
