Command Agriculture improves grain stocks for prisons President Emmerson Mnangagwa
VP Emmerson Mnangagwa

VP Emmerson Mnangagwa

Pamela Shumba, Senior Reporter
GRAIN stocks for prisons have improved due to their participation in Command Agriculture, Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa has said.

Government introduced Command Agriculture to selected farms including those owned by the Zimbabwe Prisons and Correctional Services (ZPCS), to ensure food security.

VP Mnangagwa told Parliamentarians on Wednesday that the programme had immensely contributed to addressing inmates’ nutritional requirements.

“Our stocks of grain have improved significantly due to the inclusion of ZPCS farms under the Command Agriculture programme. On maize meal, the stock levels will last until August 2017. These stocks have also been boosted courtesy of the 300 tonnes of maize received from the Drought Relief Programme.

“Furthermore, the same programme gave the ZPCS a total of 121 900 tonnes of rice to enhance their dietary requirements. We are also grateful that the ZPCS identified some farms which have been enlisted under the Government’s Command Agriculture programme,” said VP Mnangagwa.

He said ZPCS was producing enough vegetables across all prison stations and the increase in production levels had resulted in some savings as the Department no longer buys vegetables.

“A progressive total of 190 596,6 kgs of vegetables have been produced to feed inmates, whilst a total 9 934,65 kgs have also been preserved as dried vegetables for consumption in times of need,” said VP Mnangagwa.

He acknowledged that the country’s prisons were facing serious challenges due to lack of resources, making it difficult to smoothly run the prisons.
“Government makes frantic efforts to provide the necessary financial resources to ensure the effective and efficient operation of the ZPCS. It is, however, unfortunate that the resources remain inadequate due to competing priorities on the Treasury.

“In view of the foregoing, the inadequacy has resulted in the Department failing to get enough financial support to facilitate the provision of sufficient prisoners’ rations in conformity with the approved dietary scale. In an effort to make up for the gap and also address the inmates’ rations and or dietary challenges, I am pleased to report that the state of affairs pertaining to maize meal and vegetable production is sustainably good,” said VP Mnangagwa.

He said a number of measures have been put in place by Government working with its partners to improve the dietary provisions at the prisons.

“Pertaining to the provision of protein, a number of arrangements have been put in place. For a long time, challenges were being experienced on the provision of relish, especially meat.

“These challenges have since been minimised as arrangements are being made with the Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority to ensure the sustainable provision of game meat such as buffaloes and elephants to cater for inmates’ protein needs,” said VP Mnangagwa.

A supplementary feeding, he added, has also been devised to address the nutritional needs of prisoners.

“One such alternative is of corn soya blend which is being fed to the needy with nuts being received from the Ministry of Health and Child Care and the International Committee of Red Cross. In addition, the production of indigenous vegetables courtesy of the nutritional support for the National Aids Council (Nac) has gone a long way in complementing our inmates’ nutritional needs,” said the VP. —@pamelashumba1

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