* The innovative equipment as well other products in stock can be delivered to any city in Malawi through courier at company’s cost
* There is an incentive of a gift of a solar panel and its accompanying gadget that supplies electricity
* The shop is based on premises number 148 in Area 49 in Guoji Dream Town in the Capital
By Duncan Mlanjira
As farmers prepare to plant crops for the rain season, an agricultural shop in Lilongwe, Sino Borcar Investment has in stock a user-friendly maize planter and fertilizer application machine, which one person can plant over one hectare alone.
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The shop is enticing farmers that they are ready to deliver the innovative equipment, as well other products they have in stock, to any city in Malawi through courier at the company’s cost.
On top of that, there is an incentive of a gift of a solar panel and its accompanying gadget that supplies electricity as well as charging phones and other accessories.
The company’s Chief Executive Officer, Thom Huo — a Chinese national — said the maize planter was designed by technicians linked to its main company in China, Borcar Agri-machinery Company Limited.
It has just been imported from China this December 2021 and it is going at K250,000, inclusive of its delivery across the country and the gift of a solar panel and its accompanying gadget — which as also up for sale at K20,000 a set.
Huo said their shop is based on premises number 148 in Area 49 in Guoji Dream Town in the Capital, which also supplies all kinds of farming equipment such as shellers of maize, soya, groundnuts, rice shelled and mill. power tiller, water pump among many other agricultural machinery.
Huo said Sino Borcar Investment acts as an agent in selling and marketing services for the main company Borcar Agri-machinery Company Limited in China.
Former President, late Bingu wa Mutharika used to marvel the majority of farmers that they are hard working despite their toil in the preparations of their crop fields using outdated manual equipment of a hoe.
The majority of farmers in rural communities manual plant their maize seeds as well as application of fertilizer which one cannot manage to plant over a hectare by themselves.
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Current President Lazarus Chakwera has also pledged that his administration would afford small and medium scale farmers proper and affordable equipment and with the coming in of Sino Borcar Investment, the authorities can best engage the Lilongwe shop for the benefit of struggling farmers.
Chakwera also introduced the Affordable Input Programme (AIP) in which the government is subsidizing fertilizer price at K19,500 for the beneficiary farmer to pay at K7,500.
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Government introduced the AIP in July, 2020 — a month after Chakwera assumed office — to increase smallholder farmers’ access to improved agricultural farm inputs which led to increased agricultural products and increased household income through sales of surplus crop products.
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The programne goal is to attain food security at household and national levels, and increase economic wellbeing through increasing access to improved farm inputs by smallholder farming households in the country.
The 2021/22 AIP will support 3,744,105 smallholder farmers, out of 3,714,105 will access inputs for crop production — fertilizer and certified improved seed — while 30,000 will access female goats since this year, the programme has included a livestock component to be piloted in Chikwawa and Nsanje districts.
The products in stock
