By Lesnat Kenan

Lilongwe, May 30, Mana: Minister of Trade and Industry, Engineer Vitumbiko Mumba has said that the Banana Growers Conference is a platform to understand the challenges that farmers and traders face in terms of production to meet the demand in our country.

He made the remarks during the opening of a one-day Banana Growers Conference at Crossroads Hotel in Lilongwe on Friday.

He said as a country we are not producing enough to meet the demand of our country because of banana disease that came eight years ago and climate change.

"We have not been able to produce enough to feed our country. That’s why in a week, we have a minimum of 540 ,30 tones track of banana that come into our country,200 in Blantyre,150 in Lilongwe,90 in Mzuzu, therefore we need to produce our own bananas to meet the demand in our country”, he added.

He therefore emphasized the importance of promoting inclusive partnerships between farmers, financial institutions, researchers, processors and policy makers, saying this will help to co-create sustainable banana value chain.

He also explained that the ministry wanted to restrict importation but discovered that Malawi is not producing enough and this made it not to restrict importation of bananas from other country such as Zambia which means there is no restrictions on bananas.

He therefore appealed to farmers, financial institutions and other stakeholders to invest in locally owned Small Medium Enterprises (SME).

He also expressed his gratitude to World Bank through Ministry of Agriculture for sponsoring this conference.

In his remarks, Banana Growers Representative, Frank Washoni, said the conference is crucial to farmers as it will help them to have access to certified planting materials, irrigation technologies and extension support through partnerships, which are vital for boosting productivity.

He also stressed that lack of access to finance, organized banana markets and climate change as some of the factors contributing to the low supply of bananas in the country.

The event was held under the theme "from farm to market: advancing Banana Sector Growth through Inclusion, Reform, and Collaboration".