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Andile Tshuma, Business Reporter
GRAIN millers have said they are struggling to comply with the food fortification requirement given constrained capacity to acquire additional equipment and other requisite raw materials.

Grain Millers’ Association of Zimbabwe (GMAZ) chairperson, Mr Tafadzwa Musarara, revealed this in Bulawayo last Thursday where he said the move by the Ministry of Health and Child Care to demand that maize meal and other grain products be fortified, was difficult as they have to procure new equipment for the process.

“While we may have our reservations on food fortification and its impact on the human body and health in general, we are mostly affected by this new requirement as there is need for us to buy dossers, the machinery used for mixing in the nutritional supplements into mealie-meal or grain,” said Mr Musarara.

“For example, if one needs to add a kilogramme of zinc into a tonne of maize meal, it has to be done in such a way that the zinc, a small quantity as it is, is evenly distributed in the maize meal and that cannot be done by hand or any of the material that we currently have. We need to buy new equipment and it is very costly. Perhaps if Government was subsidising the purchase of new equipment and exempting duty payment it would be better.”

Food fortification is a process of adding micro-nutrients to food and is meant to prevent deficiency diseases such as anaemia, mental retardation and goitre.

Government is targeting to add nutrients to mealie-meal, wheat flour, sugar and cooking oil. Mr Musarara expressed concern that a number of small scale millers were already struggling and the new requirement would further cripple their already ailing operations.

“This mandatory fortification programme will see many millers unable to continue production especially our small-scale black indigenous grain millers.

The economic challenges of the past 10 years have seen the country’s operating black maize millers dwindling to 23 in May 2017 from 128 in 2009. The country’s operating wheat black millers have fallen to one in May 2017 from five in 2009,” said Mr Musarara.

He said millers needed over $20 million to purchase equipment and $7 million each month for the purchase of fortificants. The Ministry of Health and Child Care set July 1 last year as the commencement date of mandatory food fortification of selected food vehicles such as vegetable oils, sugar, wheat, flour and commercially milled maize meal.

Government has said it was cognisant of the primacy of disease prevention as opposed to curing and in particular the adverse results of growth retardation in children, low birth weight, reduced cognitive development, increased risk of under — five mortality and reduced economic productivity emanating from failure to prevent micro-nutrient deficiency. – @andile_tshuma