Africa News Summary : News Headlines : Discussion Forums

HARARE - The policies of Zimbabwe's government are hindering the import of grains desperately needed to stave off a famine, the United Nations and a famine warning network said in a report Wednesday.

"The government of Zimbabwe needs to encourage greater private sector participation in grain importation and to maximise the erratic food aid receipts from donors," the humanitarian situation report said.

"Current government policies pose formidable constraints on both counts," said the report, dated June 10 but released yesterday.

President Robert Mugabe's government banned private imports of maize and wheat late last year, and gave the parastatal Grain Marketing Board a monopoly on the purchase and sale of both grains.

The finance ministry can grant exceptions to the ban, but price controls have left few private traders with any interest in importing the basic foods, said the report by the United Nations and the Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWSNET).

The UN's World Food Program (WFP) estimates that about six million people will need food relief to survive until the 2003 harvest. The country is projected to have a shortfall of 1,9 million tonnes of cereals.

Government plans to import about 312 000 tonnes of food, while donors have contributed 60 000 tonnes, still leaving Zimbabwe short 1,5 million tonnes, the report said.

So far WFP has distributed food aid to nearly 95 per cent of the 558 000 people in most desperate need, the report added.

Meanwhile, cholera remains a problem in southeastern Zimbabwe, with 210 suspected new cases in the first two weeks of June and 29 people have died, the report said.

The dramatic food shortages have been blamed in part on a drought, and in part on Mugabe's tumultuous land reforms, in which more than 90 per cent of white-owned commercial farms have been targeted for resettlement by blacks.

A law passed last month had set Monday as a deadline for about 2,900 farmers to lay down their tools, but government did little to act on it.

Nonetheless, Britain and the United States criticised the stop-work order, saying it would only fuel the food crisis. - Nampa-AFP

•  Six sleeps to Big Brother!