Economist Edna Litana has observed that access to finance still remains a big challenge in the agriculture sector.
Ms. Litana notes that while the country has a duty free provision for importation of key agricultural machinery required to boost production, many people in farming do not have the actual capital required to import the specialised machinery.
She is of the view that if more people in Zambia have access to resources that can boost productivity in the sector, this will in turn help the country sort out issues around food security.
Ms. Litana says it is crucial that financing in agriculture is ramped up in order to address the need for people to generate income out of food production within the sector.
According to the Indaba Agricultural Policy Research Institute (IAPRI), Zambia suffers from undersupply of agricultural financing, especially from commercial sources.
However, the results indicate that Zambia has made considerable progress in addressing financial exclusion; a number of risk mitigation measures are in place to reduce the asymmetric information in the financial sector.
The major finance sources include contract farming, private firms, friends/ relatives/informal moneylenders, and farmer unions/cooperatives.
