MONEY IS IN THE SOIL

Chisamba farmer Builds agribusiness dream

BY MERCY NAMFUKWE

MEET Wamunyima Mayeya Simunji. Her farm is located in Chisamba, Zambia. She reflects on a life devoted to farming. Her journey is rooted in her early years, when she used to emulate her parents during farming activities.

Her journey in farming commenced in 1996. She started farming on a small piece of land measuring 30 by 50 acres, adding that it was on a small scale. But from there, she started increasing her yields yearly.

“I am now farming on more than 20 hectares of land. I grow maize, soybean, sunflower, which I process into cooking oil. I also grow legume crops such a scow pea, sugar beans, sunn hemp and groundnuts, all year round,” she said.

She added that for value addition on sunflower, she sells cooking oil from her sunflower. Mainly, the by-product, which is sunflower cake, is sold to her neighbours who are keeping pigs and come to buy the sunflower cake.

She explained that currently she only supplies her products in the community as she plans on branding her cooking oil products so that they start reaching supermarkets, Zambeef outlets, and the international market by adding value to her sunflower through processing cooking oil.

“My dream has always been to expand production of sunflower on my farm so that I can be able to process enough cooking oil, which I can start exporting to international markets. There are policies I need to meet, such as licensing and branding of my products for the export market.”

Further more, she plans on integrating new technologies on her farm in terms of advertising her farm produce. Currently, she has adopted the use of machinery such astractors, planters, rippers, discs, and shellers, which help to enhance her farming operations.

Read more in the July 2026 issue: https://www.agricoopnews.com/e-publications

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