We are also aware of the speculative tendencies by some of these project proponents. They do not have the adequate funds to develop their projects. We will continue to have those projects on our registers but nothing happening on the ground. We are aware and this time for all the licences that ZERA, the regulator is issuing. They are very strict in terms of ascertaining whether that project will develop to the final stages. They would want to be assured that the project has adequate funding. Those that would not have exhibited potential to raise the funding, up to a given period, the licences will be scrapped off. This is what we are doing as Government to listen to the IPPs and to also scrape off those licences that would have not proceeded to development of the projects but these are private sector led projects. I thank you.
*HON. SEN. TONGOGARA: Thank you Mr. President. I would like to thank the Minister for the explanation and the policies that they are implementing to ensure that Zimbabwean residents have adequate power. My question now is, are you promising the winter wheat farmers that they are going to have adequate power in order to have a good harvest? With power outages, the crop will dry up due to inadequacy of water.
HON. SODA: Thank you Mr. President. I would like to thank the Hon. Senator for a good question which had allowed me to take this opportunity to promise the wheat farmers that winter wheat would adequately be taken care of through the provision of adequate electricity. The required 85 000 hectares as indicted by the Ministry of Agriculture, our Ministry has taken note of that and we had discussions with ZESA and the division of ZETDC that there will be 120 megawatts that has been set aside specifically for the growing of wheat. Such arrangements also enclose the extended demand of electricity. If you look at our Kariba power station, it had an average of 350 kilowatts. ZESA then sat down and had discussions with the Zambian power utility. Now, from April up to August 2023, we have an increased supply of 500 megawatts from Kariba. The power generation was increased to 562 megawatts. Be that as it may, today, we are receiving from Kariba 800 megawatts so that the wheat farmers are able to access electricity for them to irrigate the winter wheat crop.
Another arrangement that was done by ZESA in order to provide farmers with electricity is that the farmers are now in clusters. A farmer who wants to grow wheat should go to ZESA in the area where they are farming and notify them that they will be growing wheat so that should we have inadequate power supplies, such farmers are given priority and allowed to get the electricity regardless of the fact that there may not be sufficient power. In short, there is sufficient electricity provision for wheat farmers but there are times when vandalism can also rear its ugly head. It is one of the problems that we are facing. People are into stealing copper wires and some also destroy transformers and steal the power poles.
When people see that there is load shedding, there would be some mischievous people who would have committed crime of vandalising copper cables and stealing poles. As a result, there will be power load shedding. Should you be one of the farmers who had notified ZESA that you are into winter wheat growing, you will be assisted. Please inform ZESA as soon as possible because there may be challenges that may have occurred because the transformer would have been destroyed or it is because of load shedding.
ZESA also took steps to assist farmers because it is known that farmers only receive payment once they sell their crops. So the farmers are encouraged to go and enter into stop orders with ZESA in the local area so that they are given power. The farmers should be honest enough to also pay for the power that they would have used. After such arrangements have been made, they have harvested and they are involved into side marketing that has a bad effect on ZESA. This leads to underdevelopment of the country. We are destroying our own selves. We should own up and encourage those that are into farming that as soon as they enter into a stop order arrangement, they must pay as and when the time is right. I thank you.
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