Post Christmas Maize Woes

There is a frightening diversity of insects flying and crawling all over the blockhouse tonight ... doubtless, the end to the three or four days of rain has induced them to come out, and as they are wont to do, make a straight line towards any light source. So far, no is too bothersome; after spending a few years in the bush with a candle for dinner company, you get inured to things crawling all over you.

There were exceptions to that rule, notably the specimens of Solifugae (wind spiders) that would emerge from the forest adjacent to my house in October and move with a speed indicative of their name towards the candle that provided my gestation's luminescence. My reaction was an uncontrollable heaving of my plate in one direction and leaping off the porch in the other.

It's far easier (in many, many ways both subtle and not) these days, particularly my ability to light a mosquito coil and prevent any organized attack by the assemblage of the Anthropoda kingdom. Instead, they fly and crawl in happy chaos, randomly hitting me in the face or drinking the sweat off my neck.

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Three things have been blaring out over the airwaves and newspapers (real and virtual) with regard to maize recently, which I will present in summary fashion:

1. Army worms came out of nowhere with the first rains and hammered the emerging maize crop in November and the first half of December. Though this didn't touch Western (a maize-growing, but not maize-producing region), it nailed the maize belt regions (Central, Southern, and Eastern) quite bad. It was bad enough for the government to expedite the release of 2,000 metric tonnes of seed maize in a relatively short period. Hope it was a 400 series, because Christmas planting is not a sure thing ... depending on our rain, this might be a short year, as the BBC doubtless hopes. 
2. Mealie meal (maize flour), the basis of Zambia's staple food [nshima] has climbed steadily in price throughout the country due to shortages in the Copperbelt. The shortages are ascribed to people purchasing job lots of the commodity at wholesale (or even retail) prices, throwing all the bags they can manage on a motorcycle, mini-bus, ox-cart, etc., and crossing the border into DRC where the price is substantially higher. Zambia's high urbanization levels makes the price of nshima (which is literally food in this country) a serious political issue. Hence, more maize is being sold by FRA towards the national milling companies, albeit at a loss vs. what they [haven't] paid the farmers. Generally, the high prices are poorly understood by Zambians high or low, who envision the milling companies as gouging them for the sustenance despite "bumper harvests". To me, an American raised with the usual inculcation of cutthroat capitalism, it's not really a surprise whatsoever. The milling companies produce something everyone [thinks they] need. They don't get elected, and they have a golden goose in front of them. Plus, they have bigger silos ... they can buy and buy and control the output of maize meal. 
3. The poor rain patterns across the maize belt. It didn't really get going until deep into November. 

How it will pan out is anyone's guess ... I doubt nationalization is on the table yet, but a poor harvest and a hollering hungry public will doubtless move the government's hand.