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After a year of comprehensive training with rice farmers in various districts, Farm Business Schools (FBS) operating in Karonga and Nkhatabay districts under the Rice platform of AICC finally graduated 58 farmers who had undergone farm business management training.

In a bid to impart an entrepreneurial mindset among rice farmers in various district that AICC under the rice platform is working on, the institutions introduced Farm Business schools training in farm business management as a way of equipping rice farmers with business skills for their agriculture businesses.

The trainings that are coordinated by AICC rice platform and highly facilitated by Agriculture Extension Development Officers (AEDO's) of various EPA's train farmers of various approaches in farming business starting from pre-season period to season and post season period.

Among many aspects, farmers are trained on how they can plan for their farming business each year, by calculating and planning how much they want to produce, how much it would cost them and their terminal benefit at the end of the season before hand. This highly help farmers to plan on how they can source their inputs as well as evaluate the viability of their farming business. Furthermore, planning also gives farmers an insight on risks associated with businesses hence giving them an opportunity to plan for such circumstance.

The Malawi oil seeds online platform has now gone live to consolidate efforts aimed at promoting the production and marketing of oil seeds.

The Government of Malawi identified oil seed crops as a key area for potential growth in the National Export Strategy (Nes).

Currently, the running costs for the data base are being covered by African Institute of Corporate Citizenship (AICC) and contributions from other stakeholders including Royal Norwegian Embassy, UK Department for International Development and Irish Aid.

It is being envisaged that in the long run, as the platform grows, the private sector will be incorporated into the data base and the platform will be used as to market and advertise products and services.

AICC Chief Executive Officer, Felix Lombe, said the platform provides information on projects that are offering extension services in different districts and extension planning areas within the districts.

“It also provides information for the four main oil seeds; cotton, groundnuts, sunflower and soybeans. “The platform further highlights the key extension services that are offered for all the target crops,” he said.

Extension coverage for the four main oil seeds is essential to the success of the oil seeds component in the NES. But, according to Lombe, a lot of gaps exist in the delivery of extension services for oil seeds.

“Although oil seeds are considered as part of the export drive, four crops, namely cotton, groundnuts, soya and sunflower were selected for particular focus. One of the specific enablers in the NES is affordable access to business development services. Extension has been identified as one of the key business development services,” Lombe said.

AICC is handling the technical aspect of the implementation with support from the Legume Development Trust (LDT).

The platform is expected to be sustained with membership fees realised from the LDT.

With the tobacco industry being under threat due to high intensity of the anti-smoking campaign, the legumes sub-sector continues to be a sub sector of interest in Malawi. After registering high prices last growing season, 2015/16 domestic marketing season for Legumes has been characterized with generally low prices even for the highly anticipated Pigeon Peas. This article seeks to provide some highlight of the Market season as per the African Institute of Corporate Citizenship’s Legumes Development Trust (LDT)

Most of the major legume crops such as Groundnuts, Soybeans and Beans have already been absorbed by the market. Prices for Soybeans fluctuated within a short period of time from early June at Mk 290/ kg to Mk 360/kg over a 3 – 4 weeks’ period. The price change was due to panic amongst traders which was triggered by speculations that due to dry spells, Soybean will be in short supply. Prices dropped and stabilized at an average of Mk 325/kg at which a large proportion of the year’s produce was absorbed by the market. Current prices are trending between Mk 300 and Mk 350 per Kg.