Compion visits Champion

The new Zambezi Dryland Maize Champion is Fred Mwabi. He received his title and award during the official opening of the recently-held Zambezi Bream Festival and Cultural Expo in Katima Mulilo. Standard Bank supported this event held earlier in August, with an amount of N$70,000.
In April this year, an evaluation of the three nominated maize producers’ farms were conducted by a team of evaluators representing the Ministry of Agriculture, Water and Forestry, the Agronomic Producers Association, the Likwama Farmer’s Union; and the Namibian Agronomic Board.
The three producers are Lennox Kulobone of Makanga in Linyanti, Fred Mwabi of Kanono in Sibbinda and Alfred Mutakalilumo of Machita in Katima Mulilo district.
“I would like to congratulate the small scale producers of the Zambezi Region for this year’s record harvest of between 6000 and 7000 tons of white maize that will be marketed,” Christof Brock, CEO of the Namibian Agronomic Board told the gathering at the Zambezi Bream Festival and Cultural Expo.

Hannes Grobbelaar of the Agronomic Producer’s Association said of the winner’s production process and practices, “Mr Mwabi has a very good understanding of how to nurture his crop, including the use of fertilisers and pesticides and how to maximise the capture of rain in his field so that the soil retains as much water as possible.” Grobbelaar, a commercial maize producer and mentor to many small scale producers in the Zambezi Region, is a member of the APA, previous member of the Namibian Agronomic Board and one of the evaluators of this competition. He commended Mwabi’s plant population and the quality of the maize that comes from his fields.
Also attending the Zambezi Dryland Maize Champion award ceremony was the commercial Master Agronomist for 2014, Andre Compion. He congratulated Mwabi on his achievements, telling him that soon he will have to move to a commercial farm in the Grootfontein district.