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afrol News, 25 February - Learning from last year's food crisis and deficit, the Malawian government has accumulated maize stocks larger than ever before. By subsidising government maize, prices are held affordable while there is hope of a decent agricultural season that finally will put an end to the food crisis. Government maize stocks stood at about 258,000 metric tons by the end of the first week of February, according to the latest reports by the US agency Famine Early Warning Systems (FEWS). The Malawian government has now imported maize amounting to about 233,000 tons. Last year at the same time, when the regional food crisis started to affect poverty-ridden Malawians, government stocks were close to empty. The Lilongwe authorities faced heavy critiques for having sold out its maize stocks to earn foreign currency - following advices from the World Bank. Food prices soared as stocks were unavailable. This year, while the Malawian food deficit remains equally large or even larger, authorities are far better prepared. ADMARC, the parastatal Agricultural Development and Marketing Corporation, is still selling low quantities of subsidised maize before the onset of household shortages, but it is able to keep food prices stable throughout the country. ADMARC maize prices are fixed at kwacha 17 per kg, representing a government subsidy of 40 percent. While most maize still is sold by private traders who obtained it from various sources, including locally, and from Tanzania and Mozambique, prices are close to ADMARC's fixed prices at all local markets. Some of the private traders who are speculating by holding on to maize to sell at higher prices during this lean period (December 2002 to February 2003) have realised that prices will not rise to last year's levels because of the full government's stocks and ongoing interventions such as the free food distributions, according to the latest FEWS report. Maize was therefore "readily available on most local markets." According to FEWS, prices are not only lower than last year, they are also stable. "This differs from last year's experience, when prices shot up between December 2001 and February 2002," the US agency says. Last year, there was no maize in ADMARC markets and private traders had taken advantage of the situation to raise prices to much higher levels than the ADMARC fixed price. - Although market indicators point to favourable food security conditions in the country, a lot of people still cannot afford to buy food on the market, even at the current subsidised prices, the US agency however warns. International emergency aid operations, intended to address the food security problems generated by last year's production and price shocks, therefore were continuing. Meanwhile, moderate to heavy rains have been registered throughout the country in February. Although the rains came late, in total they have been good for agricultural production. The rains now need to continue until at least the end March or early April to ensure that all crops reach maturity. Then, a third crisis year can be avoided.
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