Zambia has lifted all export bans in the name of ‘policy consistency’ to mitigate volatility and uncertainty in the agricultural commodities market, Finance Minister Felix Mutati said in a budget speech on Friday. He has instead replaced these export bans with a 10% export duty to assist increase government revenue base.
Zambia had in the recent past instituted a maize export ban to assist manage the food stock locally after smuggling had purportedly risen.
The southern African nation has enjoyed bumper harvests and was being considered to assist neighboring drought stricken nations like DRC, Zimbabwe, Botswana and Malawi. This created an ‘arbitrage market’ for illegal exports at the expense of local food security which government had stepped in to regulate and manage.
