The Special Assistant for Press and Public
Relations to the Zambian President, Edgar Lungu, Amos Chanda, has said that only Zambia and
Tanzania had a surplus reserve of cereals in the Southern African Development
Community (SADC) region, reports NaijaAgroNet.
Chanda was addressing Journalists after the SADC Heads of State’s summit, Monday, where they discussed the danger of starvation due to cereal deficit, poor rainfall pattern during the 2014/2015 farming season and the required interventions in terms of relief in the form of maize and cereal supplies..
"When an analysis of food security was done in the SADC region, only Zambia and Tanzania were found to have positive food balance sheet, in terms of cereal surplus," he said.
He also said SADC chairperson and Botswana President Lieutenant General Ian Khama expressed concern over the power deficit in the region and called for non-hydro based sources of energy, even as the 35th SADC summit ended with a call from the chairperson to implement agreed priorities in strategic plans in order to improve the well-being of citizens,
NaijaAgroNet gathered.
In his closing remarks, Gen Khama said the summit adopted important decisions that cut across sectors which were necessary to implement in good time saying that he recognized the continued support of the regional developmental cooperating partners (ICPs) for their immense contribution and urged them to continue with their support towards regional industrialization.
According to a communiqué released
after the summit, member states signed legal protocols among them to continue
implementing the regional agriculture policy and relevant protocols in order to
improve agricultural production and food security.In area of climate change,
summit underscored the need for the region to continue to work with all
progressive partners and strive to build consensus on a continental basis.
The summit, NaijaAgroNet learnt, also noted the significant improvement in the
security situation in the Democratic Republic of Congo and also called upon the
Government of Madagascar and all political key stakeholders to safeguard
achievements made in the nation building and reconciliation by fully
implementing the SADC roadmap.
Cyriacus Nnaji/GEE
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Pix: The Zambian President, Edgar Lungu,