The 2019 National Agriculture Fair, organised by the Malawi Confederation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry (MCCCI) together with the Ministry of Agriculture, provided another platform for the National Smallholder Farmers’ Association of Malawi (NASFAM), to showcase its excellence in agro-processing. Their efforts did not go unnoticed. They were awarded the best agro-processor trophy for the fifth consecutive year, and nine in total.

Expressing her excitement, the Chief Executive Officer for NASFAM, Dr, Betty Chinyamunyamu said, “Getting an award once is one thing but maintaining that spot requires innovation, commitment and foresight. We have won the award eight times and have retained it for the past five years.

“We are happy to be recognised as the best agro processor because we always strive to produce high quality products whether we are targeting the local market or export markets. “We have a variety of high quality products on the market which have stood the test of time such as the NASFAM Kilombero rice, large grain raw nuts, roasted nuts, beans, and Zikometso chilli sauce. This year we have added two more products to the basket. Consumers can now buy NASFAM Nsinjiro (groundnut flour) and fortified maize flour.

“The groundnut flour is already on the market, while the fortified maize flour will be on the market by October, 2019. There are three types of flour which include whole grain flour (Mgaiwa), cream of maize (commonly known as gramil), and Super cream of maize (Ufa woyera). This is a step forward in our efforts of product diversification in meeting customers’ needs,” added Chinyamunyamu.

Chinyamunyamu says the 16th National Agriculture Fair gave NASFAM the platform to showcase their products and interact with their customers. She says her organisation is motivated by the desire to see smallholder farmers make more money from their farming business through value addition.

“We are investing and focusing on agro-processing and value addition because this is what gives farmers better prices and guarantees them stable markets for their produce. Our plan is to increase the number of value added products that we are selling on the market,” she concluded.

The 16th National Agriculture Fair was held under the theme: Agriculture Commercialisation, basis for agri-based Industrialization.